


Nine times a Star War

by SpaceClams



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Action/Adventure, Badass Rey, Ben Solo Needs A Hug, Bendemption, Camp, Developing Relationship, Enemies to Lovers, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Jedi Finn (Star Wars), M/M, POV Finn (Star Wars), POV Kylo Ren, POV Poe Dameron, POV Rey (Star Wars), POV Rose Tico, Post-Canon Fix-It, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Post-Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Rating May Change, Redemption, Rey Needs A Hug, Reylo - Freeform, Romance, Slow Burn, Star Wars References, Star Wars: Resistance Reborn, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Fix-It, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Spoilers, star wars: allegiance, will go dark but I promise the ending will be happy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2020-01-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:22:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 30,142
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22030981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpaceClams/pseuds/SpaceClams
Summary: Kicks off during that year between TLJ and TROS.This first chapter is about the Leia moment we couldn't have sadly :(Chapter 2 kicks off reylo stuff and chapter 3 brings the plot and the rest of the crew.I started this fanfic just for fun, then TROS happened. And I didn’t hate it, it had its moments and I loved many of them. But we all know that TROS had some problems. So… I'll try and imagine how the romance could have looked like, how the conflict and themes could have been developed and resolved.What I'm saying is that this fic is more than a romance, I try and take the original movies and the extra material (like comics and such) surrounding it, take it apart and put it back together again.No palpatine, internal conflicts rule instead. Slow bendemption arc. Also Finn/poe romance has to be in there. Rose too. And Hux. Also Finn will for sure become a jedi.(also some chapters have suggested music. All is from the Band Nightwish... because they are the perfect balance of camp, fantasy, adventure, anger and romance - for this fic hehe)
Relationships: Finn/Rose Tico, Kylo Ren & Rey, Kylo Ren/Rey, Poe Dameron & Finn, Poe Dameron/Finn, Rey & Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 10
Kudos: 23





	1. Leia (POV Rey)

Through the window, Rey could see the orange dust of Ryloth settle over the ground. Not as hot and dry as Jakku, but still familiar. She had never seen a Twi’lek before. She didn’t know the fascination some of them still had for the Jedi. The belief they held, that she, as a Jedi, was wise and trained. That she possessed knowledge far beyond her reach. She thought of her vision of herself and Ben. She had thought she had understood it. But she had been wrong. The books she had stolen from Luke were hopelessly difficult to understand. Even with C3P0s help. There was nothing there that helped her feel more confident. Especially when faced with those inquisitive blue faces. The truth was that unless there was something she could strike down with her staff; she wasn’t really good for anything right now. Which is why she had finally, after much pushing from Finn, reached out to Leia. Leia, who had seen it all. And whose power lay not in her prowess in battle. But in something else. 

“Rey. I’m sorry. But I can’t train you.” Rey nodded, trying to hide her disappointment. Leia sighed and put a hand on her shoulder.  
“It’s sad what happened with Luke. It wasn’t your fault either if that’s what you are thinking. But right now, we only have us, ourselves, and our current knowledge. And that’s what we have to work with. And that includes the most powerful young Jedi that has been seen for a long time. There is no doubt in my mind that you can manage the challenges that are set before you..” Rey smiled at the compliment. Tried to find something good to say. Something that would embrace that source of power that Leia seemed to have. Was it hope? Or maybe faith? Faith in something… something Rey didn’t understand.  
“Is there something else?” Leias eyes were piercing into Reys. Looking for the source of her discomfort. It was so easy to forget Leias sensitivities. In the force, but also for people.  
“No. Nothing.” Rey heard the weak lie in her voice, as did Leia. So she tried again.  
“Oh. Well. There is the first order and their new leader... And he knows more of the Jedi order than I. I don’t know how to close that gap… I don’t know how to manage this advantage that he has. Still, I am supposed to be a Jedi, ain't I? Yet... still, Ben is the one with the real training.” 

She didn’t know how to be a Jedi, Finn was great at encouraging her, but he lacked actual knowledge. Poe didn’t know her. Rose was good support and awesome at technical builds. But could not say that much about Jedi powers.  
“Ben?” Leia’s face looked saturated with emotion all of a sudden. She was processing. Rey felt her heart gaining speed as she feared exactly what suspicions Leia would draw from those thoughts.  
“That’s his name. Right? Han used it. That’s how I knew... Finn was there too.“ She was rambling. This was bad. She felt her cheeks getting hot.  
“I believe Finn refers to my son as the asshole. Or the supreme asshole. I didn’t think anyone would still think of him as Ben. Not after what happened at Crait.”  
Rey nodded. Trying to force a gentle smile across her face.  
“Yeah, yeah. True.” Leia leaned closer to Rey, looking straight in her eyes. Rey had to do her best to not lean back and away from the general.  
“I feel him sometimes. In the force... I didn’t think you would too.” Leia spoke softly. The words leaving her filled with hesitation. As if speaking them hurt.  
Rey shook her head and prepared the lie in her head. But she couldn’t do it. She bit down on her words and looked down at the floor in shame. 

She hadn’t told anyone what had happened. Only Chewbacca knew that she had even gone to the supremacy at all. And he had promised not to tell anyone. However, he protested at her wish to keep it from Leia. She had promised that when the time was right. She would let Leia know. But when was the time ever right to explain something like that? 

When the resistance was hit with the news that Snoke was dead. It had been a shock. An even bigger shock had settled over the group as Rey was accused of his murder.  
“Propaganda! Meant to make the last Jedi the hottest target in the galaxy.” That’s what Poe had said. And they had all agreed. It seemed reasonable. They believed Snoke had been killed. That it had happened when Holdo had crashed her ship straight into the Supremacy. That The First Orders main interest was wanting to cover up their failure. That Luke’s sudden ruse had made Rey a target since she was the last known remnant of the Jedi. They believed that the only reason Kylo Ren was hunting Rey. Was because she had saved the resistance at Crait. Because he had her in his grasp and had lost her, while he himself was beaten down by her. No one knew about the details surrounding each encounter. Not even Finn knew what happened the first time she had fought Kylo off. 

“In the force, he is Ben. But facing me in battle. I am not so sure.” Rey finally concluded. Leia nodded. She could tell that Rey was hiding something.  
“The last thing I told Han was… That I believed that there was still light in Ben. That I wanted Han to bring him home… But I would not ask this of you now. Do not risk yourself for him. If he wanted to turn. If he wanted to come home. He would do it. It is not up to you. Or anyone else. Do you understand?” Rey felt her mouth drop. She struggled to find her words. Somehow she had believed that Leia would want her to do something to win Ben over. Somehow it bothered her if she was the only one that still wanted to try. Did she want to try? She realized that she hadn’t dared to think about it. Afraid that such thoughts would summon him across the bond. And what would she tell him then? There were no words. She didn’t know what she wanted. She didn’t know the force or what it was doing with her.  
“Yes… but Luke did turn Darth Vader. Do you not think it could happen with Kylo?” Rey mumbled. 

Leia shook her head and sighed.  
“I have had many years to think about this… About how Vader might have saved Luke, yes. And how Vader might have turned at the end of his life and found the light side again. But that was only for a short moment. He never had to face the real consequences of his actions. He never had to find a way to live with what he had done. Could he have managed that? Or would he have fallen back into old habits again? There are many men that have told their loved ones how sorry they are for their violent sins. Only to repeat them again. Until the people they claimed to have loved lay dead. I want to believe that my son is better than this. I want to hope. But I cannot lose more people to that dream. I don’t know what I would do. If you too were lost because of him.”  
Leia clasper Rey's arm and squeezed while staring into her eyes.  
“Do you understand that?” She repeated with a stern tone to her voice. Rey could feel the fear hidden in those words. She felt her eyes start to fill with tears. She felt so small and dumb. Of course, Leia was right. How could she even be thinking about this still? After what had happened last time, she and Kylo had met. 

“I’m sorry. I just. I just hoped that…” Rey had to take a few breaths to steady her voice. Leia waited in silence. Still clasping her arms, though more gentle now.  
“...If he would turn. Then I wouldn’t be alone… anymore. That he would understand… the things that others don’t.” Rey felt like she was accusing her friends somehow, of not being enough. It felt wrong to want more. She who came from nothing, she should know to be grateful for the precious things she had been given in such short notice.  
“I am here for you, Rey. Whatever it is, with the force, I am here to help you, in any way I can. And you have your other friends here. Finn, Poe, Rose, everyone. They would not abandon you. You do not need Ben, Rey. And should he decide that he needs us, then I will be here for you either way. You cannot, and will not, solve his problems for him. You are worth more than that. And never forget that I said that!” Leia blinked away tears from her eyes and let go of Rey. She stood up and started walking back and forth in the small room they had occupied. Away from the rest of the crew. 

Rey felt dizzy. She could not decide on exactly what she was feeling at the moment. Torn between anger at how little hope Leia seemed to have for her son. Confusion over why she even felt that way. Sorrow for the pain she felt in Leia's words. Shame for how she could not reach the same conclusions that Leia where feeding her now on her own. Even more shame, for how that small childish part of her still longed for the Ben she had seen in her vision. Besides Leia, she was the only, the single one to carry the heritage of the Jedi. Of all the people that had sacrificed so much for it to live on. And she still had these weak thoughts. Still, she could not believe in herself the way that Leia did. And she didn’t know how to change that.

“What did you talk about, you and my son?” Leia had stopped. Her face scrunched up in intense thoughts again. Rey felt the floor drop beneath her for the second time during the same conversation. She bit down on her cheek and focused really hard on not letting her panic show this time.  
“When? Which situations are you thinking of?” Rey croaked. Not sounding as relaxed as she aimed for.  
“When he grabbed you outside of Maaz goddamn watering hole. Before it was blown to bits by the First Order. He interrogated you did he not? I know you told me about it before you left to find Luke but… tell me again.”  
Rey let her hands fall into her lap. She started to pick at her fingernail.  
“Did he hurt you the same way he did Poe?” 

Rey shook her head, trying to figure out what to say. Something that would end this discussion before she said too much. Before she said something she would regret.  
“He wanted to know where Luke was. He was… surprised that I would even know anything. Angry, even. He said I was just a scavenger. That I was nothing... He tried to pry the location of Luke from my mind. It hurt, and he said to not worry. He said that he could feel it too... But he failed to get anything.”  
“You succeeded in defending yourself. You found the force, in a way.”  
“Yes. But also. I could feel him too. And I could see his mind. He was shocked. He ran away… and I escaped.”  
Leia shook her head and started pacing again.  
“And then you faced him again. And you saved Finn.”  
“Yes… he was hurt. Chewbacca shot him. He wanted the saber. He said that it belonged to him.”  
“Yes. Finn told me as much. But then Finn was knocked out.”  
“I called for the saber with the force. As did he. He failed again. And it shocked him this time as well. We fought. And he told me he could teach me the ways of the force. If I would join him.” Leia rolled her eyes.  
“Of course he did.” Rey tried to collect her thoughts, tried to find an end to the story, that didn’t involve lying too much before Leia would press her on it further.  
“I remembered something Maaz had told me. And I could feel it. The force. And I used it against him. He grew weaker the longer he tried to keep going. He was still bleeding… and I managed to take him out.”  
“You didn’t kill him, though.”  
“No. It went so fast… he was on the ground. His face slashed open. And he was staring at me. The ground broke open. And I remembered Finn. There was no time. So I just… left him there.” 

Leia sat down on her chair again, slowly. Her legs tired from her constant pacing. Rey suddenly remembered how Leia was an old woman. That she was still recovering after being blown into the emptiness of space.  
“Well, he doesn’t forgive easily, my son. This does explain why he is so… engaged in hunting you down. Apart from how you helped us escape. You humiliated him.”  
Rey nodded silently. But still, she hadn’t really felt like Kylo was angry at her for defeating him. No. He was angry because she wouldn’t join him. That she couldn’t agree with his decision to abandon the light. Abandon the resistance. It was more about abandoning them than it was about joining the first order. The fact that she had scarred him badly didn’t seem to faze him at all either. Rey wondered why that was. Was he so used to being abused by Snoke, that he didn’t care? She wondered if she would ever get the chance to ask him about anything of this. And if she ever wanted to hear the answers. Rey decided to opt for truth, in the frankest way possible. If Leia wasn’t on her side, who was?  
“He isn’t angry that he lost. He is… lonely. And he is angry, that I won’t join him… so that he won’t be lonely anymore.”  
Leia turned to look at Rey. Her eyes squinting.  
“He is a bit of an idiot, my son... He gets it from his father.” Leia stated curtly. Rey couldn’t hold back her laugh. She hadn’t even felt the immense tension build up in her body. But now as it ebbed away, she could feel how much the subject affected her. Rey continued to laugh while Leia was smirking back at her. 

Shortly after that, Poe broke into the room. He rambled about how he had been looking forever for them. Or rather, he had been looking for Leia. He didn’t want to say that Rey couldn’t help them with the diplomatic situations with the Twi’lek. But she understood it either way. Rey snuck out to find some food. Anything that would help her stop thinking so much. Anything that could help her cling to that laugh, and not think about all the fear that seemed to thrive in her body these days.


	2. Mending (POV Rey)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey fixes a lightsaber, but is interrupted.

Rey opened her eyes and studied the lightsaber in her lap. Still broken. Still torn in two. However she struggled, she couldn't fix it. Sighing she picked up the pieces one by one and put them back in her bag again. She had hoped that meditating on it would help. But when she closed her eyes, all she could see was all the members of the resistance, looking at her. Expecting a miracle. The day had passed without any progress. As they were currently on the trash planet Anoat. There wasn’t much for Rey to do, except practice. Trying to read the books, then, more practice. No one could find them here. The dust-particles blocked out transmissions completely. This also meant that they could not pick up any broadcast from Finn and Poe. Both were away on a mission to secure weapon caches for the resistance. 

Rey knew she needed to be strong. She needed to be the symbol to rally behind. Of the mighty yet compassionate and wise Jedi. Yet that gnawing feeling of loneliness kept creeping up on her, draining her. She feared what she might see, fading into the corner of her eye if she lost focus. When she resigned to her desperate and illogical emotions. Longing for the companionship that had been denied her. Or perhaps to catch a glimpse of him. Ben. Kylo. To know what he had turned into since the last time she saw him. Still. He was an idiot. It didn’t matter that he had chosen to bolster his own power instead of thinking about needs that weren’t his own. As it was, he would only have been a liability either way, unstable as he was. If he had decided to come with her in the throne room… for how long would that conviction last? How long until he would have lost it and started to chop everyone down. Extinguishing desperate eyes one by one. He - too fallible to be able to help anyone of them, nor stand their constant onslaught. Yes. This was for the best. She needed to find a way to accept that. Accept the pain, not fight it, nor wallow in it. 

The Jedi texts spoke of meditation as the key method for building your own lightsaber. But what to do with a kyber crystal that was cracked into two pieces? It hadn't even chosen her. At least, not in the way described in her ancient books. There was so much she didn't understand. So where could she even begin? Taking it apart and putting it together over and over had not brought her much further. So she thought that trying to feel the crystal would. Feel it in the force. She suspected her intent wasn't clear enough... Or something like that. Or she didn't know what she was doing anymore.

Too much depended on her success. Without the symbolic lightsaber in her hands. How could she hope to inspire their allies to believe in the resistance? To believe in the force? To believe in her and decide to join the cause? To rebuild the Jedi order? Make all the fairy tales come true... That was what she wanted, right? Deep in her mind, she could feel those familiar, dark thoughts. How she was not really meant for this. That she was trespassing into another person's story. Into problems too big for her. She could hear the deep hum of his voice again, stating how she was nothing. Nothing. Well. He was nothing to her now. Angry, Rey stood up. She started pacing back and forth in the small cave she had found a small distance from the campsite.

Like a fool, she waited for her parents for years. Refusing to face the truth. Because it was a truth too horrible to bear. Yet that harsh truth kept lurking on her. From the shadows, it was nipping at her heels with greedy mouths and sharp teeth. That darkness had swallowed Han. It had gobbled up her dream of being someone as Luke cast her aside. As if he deemed her unworthy. As Kylo Ren had spoken his cruel words to her. He made it sound like sympathy. He believed it too. He believed that the best she could be, would be... to be like him? To be by his side. Like a dark shadow shaped by his decisions. His truth. His victory. Such bullshit. All of it. Leia was right, they were all men too busy with their own selfish problems!

She could not save him. He did not want to be saved. Not Luke. Not Ben. Not Kylo. But there were others that did. She wouldn't put her life on hold anymore, waiting for others to decide to do better. To be better people.

Sighing and setting her teeth into that all too familiar sneer. She opened her bag and turned it upside down. All the pieces of the saber flew across the cavern floor. She snatched her staff from her back and flipped it over in her hands. She was the only one now. So she could make the rules. No one could stop her. She would find her truth. And more than anything, she was done waiting on other people.

-

Her eyes were filled with gravel and her throat with sand. But the last bolt was set. The last nut was tightened, and the handle in the middle had new straps. Her new saberstaff was finished. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She could do this. She would do this. It would be fine.

She heard her name whispered from somewhere over the dunes of sand. But whichever way she turned her head she couldn't hear where the voice came from. She heard it again. Careful. A sigh in the air. Mom? Dad? Someone? She started to run. The dunes were so slippery. She fell over. Then the voice was from a different dune. A different voice. She started towards it. Then she heard another. She stopped. The sun was in her eyes. Too bright. Dizzy, she sat down on her knees with her face in her hands trying to block out everything. Her vision covered in blind-spots. No. It's too much. What is this? Another whisper.  
“Rey.” She wouldn't move. Another, too close.  
“Rey.” Cold. Familiar. Rey let her hands fall to the floor of the cave but kept her eyes closed. She would say nothing to him. She would give him nothing. She reminded herself that, whatever may have been before, that thing got burned away on Crait. She remembered him down on his knees. Looking up at her, as if she was… well, she didn’t know what he saw in her, not after all that. And she didn’t care. She had closed that door on him, and it had stayed closed. Now he was here. Somehow she could see him, while still keeping her eyes closed. She knew what he was without looking. He had his dumb helmet back on, wielded together with red scars all across its surface. Not unlike his own skin, she thought. He was locked away again. Unavailable and very much different from the malleable grief she had seen back then, plain and open in his dark eyes. 

Why? She wondered. How?

There was a slight shake of his head, then he turned. Slowly he started pacing around her in a circle that felt too narrow. She opened her eyes to look at him with defiance radiating from every inch of her being.

“Still the scavenger stumbles as she meddles with things she does not understand.” Her eyes followed his movements as he studied her without pause. Turning around her side now. He was reaching into her mind. Feeling the questions race through her consciousness. Of course. She had reached out, to feel the crystal, to mend the saber. Somewhere during the tempering, she must have opened that door again. He was behind her now. 

Rey swallowed a nervous breath and stood up. She brought her new staff up in front of her, ready to light it if needed.

“It will not work. You cannot strike me down. Have you forgotten our first time... connected?” He stumbled on the words. Well, she didn’t know what to call it either. As she resisted his provocations, refusing to answer. She could feel her silence burning him. His movement was becoming more erratic and tense by each step he took around her.  
“I will find you. You know that. There is no hiding from the first order. And we will finish your allies, as we did on Crait, as we did on Tah’Nuhna, on Dac. Give up now and lives will be spared.” 

She laughed out loud. It was astonishing, how he could believe a single word of the garbage he had spewed. There was no surrendering to the first order. No Diplomacy. No negotiation. No gain. 

“You laugh, yet I offered you everything! You could have gained anything you could ever want and yet you denied…”  
“Everything?” Rey barked at him, letting every drop of incredulous frustration spill over into her voice.  
“Everything and anything I could ever want?” She repeated, louder. It felt good to finally yell at him. Especially after having spent so much energy struggling to keep him away.  
“Did you offer me the father whose life you took? Did you offer me the mother whose heart you broke? Or was it the friends that you murdered that you offered me? Was it my faith in you, realized? Was that the thing you were offering me? All that you had, that I could ever want, you have turned to ash!” He had stopped moving now, staring at her from somewhere beneath that jar on his head.

“What am I to do with ash and the broken shards of whatever pile of other things you’ve smashed into submission hm? What is anyone to do with that garbage...” She finished. Breathing hard. Her heart beating like a fast and heavy bass drum. Her jaw, tensely locked. He paused, longer than she had expected. Before starting his slow pace around her again.  
“Big words… for a little scavenger…” He remarked. He seemed so petty. Trying to belittle her yet again. What had he expected that she would say? Yes, please come and save me from this place? I am too bored?  
“True words… and deep inside of you, there is a person that knows that…. I know that...” Her temper had begun to cool. A damp sorrow started to spread itself like a wet blanket over her instead. 

“You know nothing of truth then. Naive and desperate you cling to dead hopes and dreams. Open your eyes, Rey. See the rebel scum for what they are. Abandon their silly fight or die with them as I hunt you down and destroy you all, one by one.” He spoke with chill cruelty but worked himself up to hot and spitting fury. He stopped and turned to her again. Raising his voice behind the mask.  
“Don’t expect mercy from me when you see me next!” 

Rey thought she would be upset, thought she might be angry again. But she just felt tired. She clicked her jaw and turned to face him straight on.  
“...Big words from a cowardly monster… What are you waiting for? I already have everything I need.” She swallowed and her voice slid into a gentle whisper. “If you want me dead, then face me. Take me down.” She slowly spread her arm out in front of her, finally, lighting the saber. It sang beside her. Glowing bright blue in the mellow cave.  
“Not very Jedi-like of you,” he remarked in a deep mumble. Rey bit down even harder on her teeth. Hissing a last whisper towards him.  
“Try it.” she goaded, gently letting her new weapon fall into an arc. Twisting it in front of her and into her other hand. By the time she clasped her fingers around the hilt again, he was gone. 

She was breathing too fast. She had to calm down. How did she get so riled up? She switched her saber off. This was not how she had intended to test it. This was not how she had expected to react when seeing him again. She wasn’t even sure if she wanted to fight him. But then again, if he threatened the resistance, then she would. Without a doubt. What did that make her? A bad Jedi? Just like he had suggested. She slowly sat down again. Feeling her emotions slide off her. She should not listen to his harsh words. She knew that. Still, disappointment had tainted the moment she had been working so hard towards. But she wasn’t sure if it was directed towards him or herself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had fun trying to recreate voices and speech in this chapter. did you like it? leave a comment or some kudos, me loves them. What do you think should happen next? :D  
> Also, wanna betaread? English isn't my first language so I use software to fix issues, but would be nice with human contact. :D


	3. Friends & a spy (POV Rey)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey catches up with bad food and friends when the resistance is hit with information that will change their tactics completely.

The sunset light on Anoat scattered across the grime and pollution in the air like burning charcoal getting caught in the wind. It was beautiful, even though the dusty windows. But it did make the throat close up and swell, taking more than a few breaths would kill most things. Rey longed for some fresh air, even Jakku was better than this. Sure she had her cave and some other pockets of almost fresh air. But they were few and far between. 

Finn and Poe arrived yesterday from one of their missions. They weren’t as used to the air as her. Even though they were sitting inside one of their ships right now. A ship that was parked inside another building, to minimize the exposure to the dust. Still, Finn was coughing and Poe was muttering as if his throat was dry and coarse. Rey knew that it was the idea of the dust that made them feel like that, though. The ship was on circulating air and oxygen. Walking outside was a challenge. But in their minds, the dust was a cloud following them everywhere. At the end of a day of training outside. The collar of Rey's clothes and the edges around her oxygen mask was covered in the dust. She would walk the long-dead cities, kicking the toxic dust into the air with her boots. Rey had never been in any urban area for long. It was sad that the one large city she was to become most familiar with was a dead one. She wondered how it had come to this. But as no natives could be found anywhere, there wasn’t anyone to ask. BB-8 had chirped something about a gassing because of a war. The pollution was why they were even hiding on the planet. Because the dust particles were so bad. The first-order could not find the resistance on the planet. Their tracking signals couldn’t pass through all the dust. 

However much Rey had missed Finn, the situation did put a downer on their reunion. Something had happened while he had been away. He was tight with Poe now. Making jokes she didn’t understand. She found herself pretending, and laughing, without really meaning it. Their weak attempt to fry some strange sausage-shaped protein portions over Anakin's laser-saber wasn’t as cozy as they had hoped for. As they held out sticks with their faux-meat close to the blue light, charring the skin, Rey felt like they were pushing it. Something had to change, or their souls would choke and die out.

“I hope we’ll find somewhere else soon. I think the dust is getting to me.” Said Finn after a particularly horrible coughing fit.  
“At least you’ve been away from here at all.” Rey laughed and patted Finn’s back. Across them Poe flinched, his brow falling into creases that had started to become a more or less permanent feature on his face. Rey did pity him. The pressure of trying to fill Leia's very large boots was clearly getting to him. Rey had the same problem, didn’t she? The difference was only the type of boots.  
“Yeah, have you found anything special in those books of yours yet?” Poe said, doing a poor job at masking his frustration. Finn made a face at his friend, trying to reel him in. Poe ignored him.  
“Are they filled with a thrilling romance? Or an adventure? Because you know… I didn’t know we had time to sit around and read at all.” Poe's eyebrows moved into different twists and turns, faster and faster the more he was rambling. Finn made an effort to cut him off but Rey preceded him.  
“Why don’t you just fly off then? And you don’t have to be around me when I accidentally blow up the station... because I tried something I didn’t understand.” Rey said. She was being sarcastic. She usually wasn’t, and she felt like it would be nice to relax and have a good time. It was rare for them to hang around at all like this nowadays. Finn rolled his eyes and set off a few very fake sounding coughs.  
“He is just salty because you’re the better pilot.” Finn stumbled through his words, squeezing in a nervous laugh. Poe also rolled his eyes back at the former trooper.  
“Yeah, she IS the better pilot. Yet she is here. Not piloting anything.” He said.  
“You’re the better pilot. And you have the stories to prove it.” Rey said. A well enough counter she thought. Poe wasn’t impressed.  
“That’s bullshit and you know it.” He said. Rey smiled at him, a poisonous glee across her face. He smiled back in the same style. 

“What’s bullshit?” Came a voice from across the ship. It was Rose. She walked up to them and looked across the little group.  
“Bullshit is bullshit!” Finn answered and then suddenly coughed as if he was about to choke on something. He was being very awkward. Rose looked at him with worry. Rey was reminded, of how Finn had been sitting by Roses side, caring for her, at Crait. She wondered what had happened but Finn always found an excuse not to tell her. Rey felt a tension in the force, circling between the three. Something was going on. Poes eyes were on Rose, completely forgetting about his frustration towards Rey. He had a look in his eyes, a mix of anger… or jealousy. And guilt… or sadness. Rey realized that this was something she did not understand. Yet another part of everyday life that she seemed to be isolated from. She was probably better off not participating in it at all, she thought.  
“Do you want a piece of grilled sausage?” Rey asked Rose, who was still looking confused. And a bit sad.  
“Is that really sausage? And where is the grill?” Rose looked very confused.  
“’tis a Jedigrill” Finn summarized and switched the saber on again.  
“Yes it’s a very forceful barbecue…” Poe added when the saber roared to life, blinding them all.  
“Ah-hah” Rose nodded. Not quite reaching the laughter that Poe and Finn were going for.  
“It’s not that good but it’s different.” Rey offered in her most diplomatic tone. Which sounded weak and nervous to her ear.

In a room with people, Rose was easy to forget about, but she was a mighty personality. And she hadn’t hesitated to help Rey when she needed it. Rey wasn’t so sure she would have the same courage if she didn’t have the force. The last months Rose had grown closer to Leia. She was speaking to ambassadors across the universe. She had a skill and power with words that they all needed. Someone that could make anyone feel what this fight was actually about.  
“No, it’s fine. Actually, you guys need to move towards the CIC. Leia has an announcement to make.” Rose explained then started to back away. Rey, Finn, and Poe looked between themselves before getting to their feet and packing up their stuff.  
“What is it about?” Poe called after Rose.  
“A sensitive message… so you better get your asses in there quickly.” Rose called back.

-

Everyone was collected around the communications tech in the resistance command central. Leia looked a bit more excited than she had been for a while. Her eyes glittering with mischief.  
“We have a spy in the first order,” Leia announced. This spy had sent them information about the condition in the first order, which was bad. Kylo Ren was spending most of his time going on treasure hunts with his knights of Ren. No-one knew what he was doing. But in his absence. A power struggle had begun among the upper leadership. Former imperial officers had made their way into the first order. Despite their contempt towards the first order. The former imperial officers had begun hoarding power and resources within the order.  
Leia explained that the spy had supplied the resistance with maps. Maps of where the different groups tended to group together. And lists with names of important people within each warring group. With this information, they could start to chip away on the first order - collapsing it from the inside. At least, that was what Leia purposed.  
“We will nourish this conflict, confuse our enemy, and let them destroy each other. They will know fatigue and a longing for a peaceful retirement. It is time we brought the fight back to them. On every ship, on every base, we will sabotage their armaments. We will find and empower defectors wherever they can be found. We will break the people free of the machine and feed them hope of a better world. And piece by piece, we will turn that hope into reality.” Leia stated.  
The crowd cheered. But Rey could only smile weakly at her friend and master. She didn’t know what to make of a situation like that. She knew nothing of politics, of diplomacy. So she knew even less of political conflict. All she heard, was that Kylo Ren was looking for something. That something probably being force-related. And that would without a doubt come back to haunt her. She needed to know what he was doing, in order to be prepared. She would not be able to talk that him down, she had tried before and failed. No, she would have to be ready to face him in battle. 

“Do we know who is the leak?” Poe asked, looking skeptical with his hands resting on his hips.  
“No. We will make efforts to try and find out, but… We need to act on this information now. We cannot afford to lose this chance. This is how we can finally turn the battle around.” Leia said. She was met with a murmur of agreements and questions.  
“…Starting with ships.” Leia interrupted before too much doubt had the chance to spread.  
“Ships?” Poe asked. Finally stepping forward into the circle surrounding the General.  
“Clean ships. Provided by the first order. Our spy has a list of ships deployed on current missions in the galaxy. We have isolated the ones with… older tracking and few soldiers. We will take them. And we will use them to infiltrate the order.” Leia said.  
“Do we dare trust this information? What if we steal a ship, and it turns out to mark us, kill anyone that dares to touch the thing.” Poe asked.  
“How does the spy even know tracking tech? Are they high up in management or way down in the workshops?” Rose filled in.  
“Of course we will have to check the data before we jump on board. We will not act on assumptions alone. But this is our start. Now let’s get to it.” 

Rey hurried out of the room, leaving Finn, Poe, and Rose to discuss their plan of action. She found her way onto the millennium falcon, and the ancient Jedi texts she had currently stored there. She had been asking C3P0 to read to her whilst she was helping repair the ship. She flipped through the pages with notes and reminders left in between. What could he be looking for? What could he possibly need? More power? More knowledge? A weapon? She studied illustrations of saber designs, on force techniques and fighting stances. Legends and memories. Nothing stood out to her. Finally, she gave up, and sat herself down on the floor, closing the books beside her. She closed her eyes and tried to breathe. In the distance she felt Finn, closing in, filled with concern. He felt brighter these days. She wondered if he was happy.

Finn knocked on the wall before popping in his head.  
“Sorry, am I bothering you?” he asked her. Rey shook her head and smiled, a genuine smile this time.  
“No, not at all.” She said. He sat himself down next to her on the floor.  
“So… where are they?” He asked. Rey smiled, he really did know her, didn’t he? She picked up the books again and opened one over her knee, and handed him another.  
“I have no idea what he is looking for.” She said. Finn nodded and hummed, he flipped through the images in the book, making it quite apparent that he didn’t understand much. Finally, he closed the book again and placed it back on the floor.  
“You know what. You took that asshole down before. Without knowing anything of the force. He is confused and childish, so he will always be weaker than you.” He said and put his hand on her shoulder.  
“Yes,” Rey said. She felt guilt flood her body. Guilt for not telling him the complete truth. But he would judge her, wouldn’t he? For arriving so late to Crait… because she was busy killing a monster - in order to empower a bigger monster. One that was so much harder to fight.  
“I should tell you about something,” Finn said. Rey angled her head to get a look at his face. He was looking into the book again. He had opened it and was staring at the pictures of Jedi fighting forms. She shouldn’t press him on it. She didn’t deserve it. But then again, if she didn’t press him. She would seem disinterested, a bad friend. She cleared her throat.  
“Oh, like what?” she said. He turned a page over, and back again, and over, and back again. His eyebrows moving up and down. He seemed stuck on the verge of something. She could have a quick look into his mind, try and feel what it was. But that would be wrong. That would be treacherous, wouldn’t it? Finn arrived on a decision of some sort, that much she could feel even without looking into his mind. He shut the book closed again and turned towards her.  
“You know Rose… and I… had this mission. And you know Poe... We had this mission. And I was just…” He said, then he croaked. And his attention flew towards the wall, his back stiff and face turning ashen. He was panicking.  
“You know what. It was nothing.” He added. And he swallowed.  
“Are you sure? Rey said. Smiling, even though she was trying not to.  
“Yeah, yeeah I’m sure. I’m fine. Everything is fine.” He rambled, way too quickly.  
“Okay. If you say so.” She offered. Then laughed gently.  
“Pfff do you wanna go back and see if they have decided what they need us for yet?” Finn asked and stood up.  
“Yes. Let’s do that.” She said and walked beside him back to the CIC, laughing silently the entire way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gotta kick that plot into action! I have basically scripted the whole thing now... I think... am struggling a bit with the ending. I guess we'll just see how I feel writing the thing and then that will determine the end heh.


	4. Visions (POV Rey)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo is doing something, and Rey finds it harder and harder to ignore it.  
> Also, Rey is angsty.  
> Finn tries to be the best friend ever, but it's hard.
> 
> This Chapter now has a soundtrack to set the mood:  
> Ever Dream (Wacken 2013) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwGSAFarHRg

She had a headache. A headache she hadn’t had since leaving Crait. Through the whole infiltration mission onboard the First order star cruiser. The impatient and angry pressure above her eye would not relent. She had been working together with Finn, Poe, and Rose, sabotaging the cruiser. She and Rose had gone crazy on the navigation system. And finally, the whole ship had crashed like a burning meteorite into a nearby sun. Watching the blinding explosion from one of the fighters they had stolen. Her headache was amplified until it was hammering against her entire forehead. The goal was to capture the Tie-fighters meant to protect the cruiser. And they had. About a dozen of them. The resistance could fly home in style. Or, at least, after the fighters got a bit of stripping and scrapping. 

It was while scrubbing the fighters from any first order trackers, that they received the happiest news yet. They had a new base, Black spire, on Batuu. A tropical paradise and nothing like the dust cloud Rey had gotten used to. She thought back on Takodana and the lush forests there. How naive she had been back then, shocked by the green life flourishing everywhere. Being silly and telling Han how she didn’t know there was that much green in the entire galaxy. And when he, the dark knight of ren, came for her or BB-8, she ran, didn’t even know that she had the power to fight back. 

As she and her friends traveled to their new location, she had a few days to think about what could have been. If Kylo had never found her. If she had returned to Jakku. Or stayed with Maaz, or waited for the resistance along with Han. Or even if she had run away with Finn. The different scenarios played in her head as the pressure increased at her skull. But she wouldn’t let her hopeful thoughts of Black spire be tainted by worry over what was causing that feeling. 

A few days later, they were there, HQ at the ancient ruins of Black spire. Meeting up with the team that made it all possible. But people where tired. After a quick reunion party. Consisting of eating protein packs and conducting small talk. Rose went back to the workshop while Finn & Poe disappeared to pinch the best rooms. Rey imagined that the best rooms for them were rooms close to each other. She was happy for them, but also sad for Rose. But then again, she shouldn’t be sad for Rose. Because that woman seemed to have her own thing going with her career and the cause and everything. It was only her, Rey, that was confused. A type of fifth wheel to the lovely couples and the hardworking resistance fighters. If her friends would share with her, what they were going through, then it could feel better, easier. But then again, they couldn’t really ask her advice on issues of love or morality so what was the point? They knew she wouldn’t get it and they were right. 

She found herself a room close to an exit and cornered away from most other rooms. Putting her books into the small and very rustic place. She realized that this was her first time having a room of her own since Jakku. Solitude was a balm to her nerves, but she couldn’t let herself wallow in it. People needed to see her and to see her work. To inspire them and give them hope. Even on Jakku, she had been relentless. She could not be less now. She dragged her finger along the wall, remembering the scratches she used to make way back then. Her friends and the resistance helped her keep track of time now. She didn’t need that anymore.

Rey set up a training track, with tips from Leia and inspiration from a few pieces of the texts. Finally, she had space and an environment to run without an oxygen tank on her back. She could practice some real moves. She breathed in air that tasted of springtime, a new concept that Leia had explained to her. Her body felt stronger than before. She was more agile, more confident. She had the stamina to keep running, to keep climbing, no matter the terrain. 

She was putting all she had into her run-through of the course, BB-8 observing her progress. Then that pressure to her head returned. It was much stronger than before. It caught her unprepared. A pit opened up in her stomach and it was dragging her down into darkness. Her vision went blurry and then she was elsewhere. Sweet voices whispered in her ear, of freedom and power. A flash hit the ground before her, on a dark and wet planet. She wanted to back away, to turn away. But behind her waited a hooded figure. It roared into action towards her. Its hood fell back. Her own face. With yellow eyes, burning with fury, stared at her. Then without warning, it lit it’s red weapon and stabbed her through her gut. She didn't even have time to scream. Rey bent forward in pain. The smell of her own singed flesh filled the air. She fell to her knees, dying. She looked up on an unfamiliar but ancient building, burning. Young kids and teenagers were at each other's throats. Screaming as they were tearing each other to pieces. Cruel whispers drilled their way through her skull, a familiar voice. Snoke? Deafening, echoing, filling her head until it was about to explode. Agony twisted her heart, a bottomless sorrow screamed in her throat. She was crawling away from the sea of fire, her legs gone, her arms gone, her skin burnt away. Misery. And greed, a fury for being denied what was rightly hers. Blinding blue lightning, burning her face. Scarring her body, turning her into a crippled monster. Her own smooth face, again, but now falling back, gray, dead. Sorrow, that was so starved that it swallowed all the light in the world with one last breath.

Rey gasped and fell to her knees. She was in the forest. She was alone. Her saber was in her hand. It was burning the grass beneath it but it was in her hand where it belonged. She squeezed it before turning it off. She told herself that she was safe. She took a calming breath, trying to stop her heart racing. It was him, Supreme leader Kylo Ren. She knew it. He had done something. Somewhere in those visions he was present. Had he too seen exactly what she had seen? What did it mean? What was he doing?

She heard the chirping of a droid, then she remembered. BB-8! She had felled a tree over him, crushing him beneath it.  
“I’m so sorry!” She told the little droid as she pulled the heavy trunk off him. She hurried back to headquarters with BB-8 to get him fixed. She should tell someone. Leia? Someone, about what had happened. But to what end? More and more, she was beginning to realize that this was her fight. No one else would understand it. And no one could help her with it. The others would think her a liability. Or even weak and incompetent, if they knew about the connection she had to the Supreme Leader. And the more Poe raged about the damage on BB-8. Even though he had just crash-landed with the Millennium Falcon. The more Rey felt like her conclusion was true.

-

Finn held up the wooden practice saber. Keeping an almost correct stance according to the books. But who cared about following the books down to every little detail?  
“This good?” He asked.  
“Yeah it’s good.” Rey said, nodding.  
“Are you sure, because if I get hit in the head… because my guard is bad, then you know I might not get another shot at it.” He said. Rey laughed.  
“You have used other weapons to fight right? As a trooper? Don’t worry you are fine, really.” She said. As he got a bit more confident, he straightened out the small weird angle that was off to begin with.  
“Yes, let’s go!” he said. He was pumped. And so was Rey. She went in for it, swinging at him from above, then twisting to slide in from the side. He followed her and blocked, then it was his turn to attack. She could read him by the turning of his shoulders, before he was lashing out. She could read him by the fragment of an expectation of his movement. He was so slow. But so had Kylo been, on the death star. He was never that agile but in that fight he was also half unconscious from blood loss. He couldn’t manage to move his large body around with much speed or grace. Was there something in him that longed for self-harm? It was not desperation that had kept him going. Was it only anger? Rey didn’t realize her mistake until it was too late. 

Dressed in his black getup. He was walking straight at her. She could feel him blink in surprise underneath his helmet, before seeing her. Behind her, something was singing. The force, screaming in a loud chorus. She looked over her shoulder, trying to see it. But there was nothing there. She gasped as she felt him reach for her, his hand reaching out towards her throat or arm or face. His mouth was forming a word she didn’t have time to hear. Everything lost its focus, and she was sitting on her behind on the forest floor. Finn was standing above her, shock on his face. The practice sword falling out of his hand. Her head was hurting. Like it had almost been cracked in two.  
“Force! I’m so sorry!” Finn said. He crashed down beside her, grabbing her shoulders.  
“Are you okay?!?” He asked. Staring at her with eyes filled with guilt, concern, and fear. Rey nodded, trying to catch her breath. She felt for that new pain on top of her skull with her hand, it was both numb and pulsating at the same time. But as she looked at her hand, there was no blood on it. She was going to get a real good bruise and swelling.

“What happened? I was swinging for you, but all of a sudden you had tapped out. But it was too late.” Finn said. Rey wished that he would stop feeling that nauseating guilt. But what could she say in order for him to let it go?  
“I saw something. I got distracted. It wasn’t your fault.” She said. Finn was studying her, moving across her face and her eyes.  
“Saw what?” He asked. Confused.  
“I don’t know. It was a forced thing.” She explained. Finn still didn’t let go of her shoulders. He felt something. Rey found herself studying him too, his face and eyes, and the thoughts brewing in there. He knew. He could feel that she wasn’t telling the whole truth. He knew and it hurt. She could feel it. Rey swallowed and closed her fist around some innocent strands of grass, tearing them off. She sighed. He didn’t deserve this. And she shouldn’t let her fear lead her, could she? A Jedi faces her fears. That’s what the texts said. And she did believe it. She looked back up at her friend, tried to find refuge in the comfort he was clearly trying to offer her.  
“I saw him. He is moving toward something. An object… or a place, with a strong presence in the force.” She said. It felt good, to tell the truth. Now she hoped that he would accept it.  
“Him?” Finn asked.  
“Kylo Ren.” Rey said. The name burning on her tongue.  
“How is that possible?” Finn asked. Calm, serious. Not at all the funny and lighthearted Finn that she was used to.  
“I don’t know. I only know that it happens… sometimes.” She said. Her confession hadn’t blown up in her face. Not yet at least. She felt her hope take hold and grow.  
“It has happened before?” he asked, incredulous.  
“Yes. But don’t tell anyone. They wouldn’t understand.” She said. Then she picked up her practice saber again and started to stand. Finn let go of her shoulders. But he wouldn’t get up yet. He looked up at her from where he was kneeling.  
“Rey… Does anyone know about this?” he asked. His voice gentle, soft. But there was a current of anger in there. Of disappointment.  
“Yeah. You do.” She answered. His eyes went wide again, his jaw dropping.  
“…And I sort of told Leia. So it’s fine.” She filled in. Which helped get that jaw back in place again.  
“Force, Rey.” He said and stood up. Forgetting about the saber, forgetting about everything. Rey bent down and picked up his saber instead. Then she held it up to him. He was looking at it like it was the strangest thing he had ever seen.  
“Oh, can’t we just try another round? I want to clear my head before the headache comes back.” She said. He took the saber from her grasp. But he was still distracted and not his normal and happy self.  
“We can talk about this later if you want.” She offered.  
“Just tell me. Should I be worried?” He asked.  
“We’re at war….” She said with a shrug.  
“Oh… Yeah… True. But-” He started. He was about to protest again, not letting it go. Rey swung her wooden saber at him and forcing him to block it or get hit. It was the perfect distraction, and he was cut off from his current line of thought completely. She kept the pace high, knowing that Finn would bring this up again if she let him catch his breath. If she could push his opportunity to question her about Kylo way into the future. Then that would be preferable to arguing about it right now. She was as confused as Finn anyway. She shouldn’t have told him.

-

They sparred until their bodies couldn’t take any more. Then they walked back towards headquarters. Finn wanted to talk more, way more, about the Kylo thing. But he was also completely exhausted. And Rey dodged the subject to the best of her abilities. Finally, by the gate of HQ. He tried again, whispering as not to spill her secret. That’s when she realized that this was a thing now, a secret. Before it was just her and Kylo, shared between them. Now it was its own entity, to be controlled. Maintained. Before too many knew. It made her soul feel very tired along with her body. She turned towards Finn and squeezed out a smile. The best one she could muster with her patience so depleted.

“So are you with Rose. Or Poe? Tell me, really.” She said. Finn stopped dead in his tracks, pulling back a few inches. He knew this was a way to shut him up. But, he didn’t have a way to deal with it. He struggled for a moment, then he turned and walked around Rey. Moving into the gates without saying anything. Rey followed, feeling guilty. She had gone too far for the wrong reasons. In the hallway, some resistance members were walking up towards them. Her chance to mend this would slip away at any moment. She had to try and patch this up before they would be swallowed up by work again. She shouldn’t let bitterness between them fester.

“Finn. I’m sorry.” She whispered, amplifying the words across the force. Making sure he and he alone would hear her. He stopped. Turned towards her, he nodded slowly. He was okay. He sighed and turned to walk away again, but stopped.

“I’m not really with anyone, I think. But maybe I want to be.” He whispered back. She heard him. Though she shouldn’t. Rey scrunched her face together into her common frown. He had felt different lately. But she had only thought it was because he was in love. With someone. Probably. But perhaps she was wrong. Perhaps something else was going on. And she had been too self-absorbed and busy to notice what was going on with her friend. As Finn walked away, gathering his thoughts, She felt something else pressing on her mind. Something clawing at her attention from somewhere far. Rey's face turned into an even deeper frown, and she set her teeth. She was so tired. She imagined an ocean. She breathed. She imagined an island. An island drenched in solitude, floating away in a sea of chilling cold waves. She focused so hard she heard her jaw click. So hard that her imagined icy waves made the hairs on her arms stand and her body shiver. She needed this victory. She smiled at the feeling of him retreating. Giving up. He would try again. But this time, he failed. And it felt good to gloat over that for a moment.

Rey made her way into the shower. She had her dinner with her friends. Some type of soup made from roots and beans. Rose left early for bed. Finn seemed okay. But things were more complicated now, she realized that. Poe looked at her, joking. She didn’t get it. She joked back, he didn’t get it. Finn rolled his eyes. She felt lonely, like an outlier again. 

She was ready to pass out. She said goodbye and dragged herself to bed. Things were going to be okay, weren’t they? She fell asleep, not feeling so sure about that or anything else. 

-

Once there had been only the single line upon the wall. Then there were a thousand. Finally, there was an infinite number of days scratched into the walls of her durasteel home. Her fingers grew old and crooked. Her cries turned into dry and silent rasps in the back of her throat. They left her behind, again and again. But their faces were lost to her. She cried after them as a child, as a woman, screamed as something unrecognizable. But there was no answer from anyone. The nightmare wouldn’t end. And she was so tired, so sad, so hungry and she was,  
“So lonely... So afraid to leave. At night...” Her breathing was labored. Her gaze, drilling holes into the wall turning away from that face, that forced intimacy. But his deep voice was there, calm, so close to her, mocking her pain. Rey frowned.  
“...desperate to sleep. ” She shouldn’t allow herself to be afraid of him now, not anymore. She knew that he was just a man and not a machine nor a monster devoid of all emotions. No matter how hard he tried to be. He was still human, and that had given her hope. But now it made her angrier. How dared he. How could he think so highly of himself, and so lowly of others? She can feel his cruel breath whisper against her cheek. She can feel glowed fingers comb the strands of her hair. 

“You imagine an ocean.” He mumbles. Her limbs can’t escape from the cold restraints keeping her down. Yet again she is stuck in a hopeless situation. Being treated like she has no voice, no will of her own, no importance. She can’t bite down on her desperation any harder so she turns her head towards him instead. What had he looked like at this moment? His eyes are filled with a poorly veiled sorrow that she recognizes. They are filled with the compassion that she had always longed for.  
“I see it...” His words are weak, stumbling out of his mouth as if he didn’t want to admit them. He swallows, and his breath and his face are too close and she can’t decide. Can’t comprehend if this is a mockery or a misunderstanding.  
“I see the island.” Her eyes won’t blink. Only stare into his until her own burns and her own face is looking back at her from the black emptiness. In the dark mirror on Ahch-to, she was breaking into weeping as loneliness had settled over her. There was no one out there. She was so cold. She clasps the blanket around her and leans closer to the fire. She finally blinks, and he is sitting opposite to her. Relief flows through her as he is vibrating in the air, close enough to touch. 

It had been easy to start telling him the story of what happened. With Luke. And the cave. Easier than it should have been. He was a good listener. Taking in more than most would suspect. His eyes are damp with unshed tears. Listening to her voice, her attempt at putting her pain into words. Or it is his own memories, bleeding into the moment, tormenting him. Perhaps this is when that loneliness had become too familiar. Why had she even been mad before? He was right here open in front of her and had always been to some point, had he not? She blinked again and felt a tear pearl down her cheek. It was difficult to think, to remember anything but this.  
“I never felt so alone.” She explains. 

“You’re not alone,” he whispers, a statement as true as any could ever be. It is frail in the air between them, but it touches every inch of her body.  
“Neither are you.” She whispers back, a promise. One that she has decided to keep.  
“It isn’t too late.” The hairs are standing up on her neck, and she is reaching out from underneath her blanket. He tears his glove off and reaches for her hand. His fingertips brush against hers and pure, warm elation jolts through her body. His eyes are unveiled. The doubt, the agony, the longing, and the loneliness. The ambition, the anger, the curiosity. All are ripples on his surface. But there is more. She wishes that it could have continued. That he could have seen exactly what she had seen, feel the truth of it take hold in his body. The two of them, side by side, together. She clasps his hand between her own. Smiles and closes her eyes, trying to write this moment into her memory forever. At this moment. She could believe that she would never be alone again. He would never leave her side and he would be there no matter the darkness that threatened them. They’d win, no matter what obstacle dared stand in their way. 

A gentle tickle hum in her skin as his thumb is drawing a small circle in her palm. Her heartbeat eases into a hard, steady rhythm. Until his fingers lightly slide past into her wrist. A violent jolt flashes through her body again, pinching her nerves. She is aware that the cold and the rain has given her a burning fever. It is spreading through her body like wildfire. She tries to breathe calmly. She reaches into the sleeve of his uniform with trembling fingers. Careful because his skin is thin and sensitive there. She wants to open her eyes. But something sour claws at her throat so she keeps them closed. She doesn’t want him to see how pale she must have turned, her face feeling drained. She doesn’t want it ruined. Why couldn’t she have this in her life? There were answers to that, good ones. But they all seem like faint whispers from long ago. She blinks until her eyes agree to remain open. His eyes are on her, studying her. He is thinking hard about something that he doesn’t share with her. But the air is salted with his heavy thoughts, still too far away to be heard. He swallows and whispers something containing her name. She is summoned by the word. She stands up and her stomach turns. 

As she steps closer to him, she drops his arm and his face falls. As she extends her hands towards him, they are covered in the white light of a first order ship. She clasps his shoulders, and he takes a quick breath under her hands.  
“I can’t hear you.” She mumbles. He is looking up at her, eyes forced wide open. He tries to say something. But his mouth won’t move. She still can’t hear him. His black hair is silky smooth between her fingers. His forehead falls against her abdomen. A sigh settles over him. Joy fires off inside her body as he pulls her close - like the real one never would. There should have been no Luke interrupting them. No Snoke infiltrating their minds and manipulating them. There should have been just the two of them, undisturbed, together. 

His hands travel along her back and into her hair, pulling her face down towards his. It feels good to let him do it. She realizes that she is smiling like a fool as he breathes her name into her ear. She is laughing soundlessly as he mumbles something into her temple. It is too much. It is so embarrassing, intoxicating, and she is so silly. Her eyes are closed again, like a weak shield. His naked hand, wet from the rain in her hair, caressing her cheek. Then her neck. She shivers.  
“So cold” She mumbles at nothing in particular.  
“I’m sorry,” he whispers and places a gentle kiss on the cheek he just touched. It feels numb afterward. As if he had stunned her there. She’d seen that before. Loving parents kissing the fat cheeks of their children. But this is something else. Is it good or bad or something other than that? Her smile melts away as her body goes hot and limp, the fever taking hold of her arms and legs. She feels so weak. Scared, she struggles to open her eyes yet again and she looks down into his face. His eyes are salty mirrors and longing, too many thoughts spinning in the air between them. There is something that she wants to say. Perhaps tell him how beautiful he is or how good he feels like this. How much she wishes, how much she wants. But none of that comes out of her mouth. 

“Stay,” she whispers. Pleading, as the warm yellow light of her little campfire, plays over the surface of their skin again. He sighs once more, trying to shake off a feeling or thought that keeps bothering him. She closes her eyes to feel that breath against her skin before it could be lost forever. She stays unmoving, calm until his lips brush against hers. He is brimming with trepidation. It is seeping through his skin. She swallows and waits. His breath is shorter now against her mouth. His hands tremble as they move over her neck and down over her shoulders. 

She smiles against him, and maybe she felt him smile too. Then he kisses her upper lip. Then he moves to kiss her lower lip. Then he settled somewhere in the middle and stays there. His fingers moving up again to fiddle with her hair. Slowly his thumb moves across her cheek towards her mouth as he angles his head to the side. She knew this. The teenagers on Jakku. Boys she’d tried to befriend, some of them cute. Mocking and teasing her. Trying to put her down. After she’d tasted their kisses and dreams. They had all turned to ashes in her mouth. But Ben's thoughts echo in her head now as if spoken straight into her ear. How he’d not betray her. How he is begging for her to want him, to feel him, to stay with him. Her body is like jelly. She cannot move, cannot breathe, and she does not want to. When she opens her mouth, she can taste his breath. She can fill her lungs with that steaming air. Then his mouth is soft against hers again. His lips, his tongue gentle as he carefully explored what would please her. Yes, this had been what she had wanted, before it had been ruined. She is consumed. Tired in ways that sleep cannot undo but excited with pulsating adrenaline. It is reflected in him, amplified in the strings tying them together. 

What would he feel like? To touch, to taste and to explore. She’d had so little of this and it wasn’t fair. Not knowing every detail of what it is like to be with someone, someone that understood, hurt. To not have what so many others had. What her friends had. She lets the strands of his hair slide between her fingers. Then she closes her fists tight. The hair twang as she increases the tension. His head is pulled back with it and his sigh whisper against her lips again. She longs to fall into that pleasure, far away from the world. She lets go of her grasp and leans towards him again. Kissing him back in a way that seems much too hard and sloppy. He is moving with her, forgetting everything but this. His hands slide down her back towards her hips and he pulls her body flat against him. He is warm. He leans over her, and she realizes that they are both standing now. And she is small as she is placed with her feet between his. Her legs are touching his, her chest leaning into his. Her lungs are burning, so she pulls back from him, breathing in deep haggard breaths. She is burning, and she is hot and sweaty as if she has run across the highest dunes. As if she’d battled. Her eyes sting as she opens them again. His eyes are there immediately, close, filled with that same intense longing. Filled with something that must be want and something that seems like greed. It makes her uncomfortable again. He caresses her along her spine, but it is different now. She is shivering. He smiles as he leans in and kisses her neck. Then he does it again, persistently. His hands tying into knots in the back of her shirt. Behind him, the throne room is a savage battleground. Covered with blood, bodies, and fire. There stand the window device used to show her the resistance ships as they were being shot down. Her body locks into a harsh and stiff cramp. She cannot move, hardly breathe. She feels him hesitate, failing to soothe her. His hands come up to touch her face. They are cold and somehow covered in his gloves again. 

“Please,” he whispers. The sound is faint but still, it cuts her. He turns to look into her eyes, but she turns away. She doesn’t want to meet that gaze right now. It would only be filled with disappointment. Judgment. Perhaps anger. It is not what she wanted from this. Rey set her jaw as fury started to join the fire raging in her body. She is more furious than she had allowed herself to be in a long time. She puts both her hands onto his broad chest and pushes him down. He falls back onto his bed back in the cottage from his memories. He is wearing that white wrap-shirt. His eyes look younger. He is surprised. Nervous. Curious. A few years younger than herself instead of a few years older. He doesn’t have the familiar scars. 

“Are you afraid of me?” She doesn’t know why she needs to ask him. But she does.  
“Perhaps…Sometimes…” His mumble is barely perceivable. This is not something he is used to contemplating. It puts him on edge. Rey smiles and swings her leg over him. Soon she is straddling his hips.  
“You like this.” He continues, a faint smile on his face. His bare hands find her knees, her thighs. She hates her pants. Her arm wraps are gone somewhere, but her tunic isn’t.  
“Do you?” She asks him. She laughs as she grabs the hem of her top, pulling it up over her head. She is pleased when he fails to answer. His breathing getting heavier, his hands sliding up over her hips. His thumbs moving over the edge of her pants. She tosses the shirt and puts her hands on his chest. Leaning over him.  
“Or do you prefer to fight me?” His hands glide over her bare back, feathering over her breastband.

“Rey,” he whispers, his gaze traveling over her body. It emboldens her even more. She is smiling as she kisses him again. She loses track of time. As he is squeezing her against his body, devouring her mouth. She gets up again to tear off her breastband and gasps as his hands move over her breasts.  
‘“Rey,” he pleads as she is grinding against him. She curses at him when he flips her over. His shirt is gone and her scar is there again on his face. She traces it with her fingers as he lays down between her legs. Her pants are gone. He is heavy as he kisses her into the smooth pillows. Her struggle to breathe under him is sweet and wonderful.  
“Don’t shut me out. Rey.” Her name is a moan on his lips as she kisses his neck. She is broken somehow. Insatiable. The black of his bedroom makes his pale skin stand out. She never knew that she could find it so appealing.  
“Ben,” She whispers, lost to the feeling of his fingers caressing the inside of her thigh.  
“What?” He asks. His hand is on her breastbone now. He is looking at her face. Drunkenly he is trying to study it. She looks at him between her lashes.  
“What?” she repeats the question. Turning it over in her mouth. It is supposed to mean something. Isn’t it? She blinks and has to cover her eyes with her hands for a while. She has to breathe, she can’t breathe.  
“What happened?” She asks. But she is alone. She is asleep.

-

She had a headache. It was crippling and the room was spinning. Rey felt the motion sickness build as she was laying there on her bed. The room felt cold. She looked down over herself. She had a few bruises on her skin after her sparring session. She was also mostly naked. Because she had tossed her clothes off in her dreams. Her stupid dreams. Her tunic was on the floor. She crossed her arms over her chest and curled up on her side. She was a creep and a traitor. And she was an idiot with silly, selfish, desires that should have fizzled out long ago. She felt like crying, but she couldn’t decide why. Which made it harder, because she didn’t want to cry for the wrong reasons. Like, crying over a man that didn’t exist. Only in stupid dreams that weren’t real but that felt very vivid. 

She stared at the wall in her bedroom. Imagined scratching a line into it. Marking how she had indeed survived this day and night. She should have done it before when she had put her things in here. Her vision was moving between focus and blurriness. It didn’t help to blink. She didn’t understand why. She wasn’t drunk.

There was a knock on the door. Rey must have fallen asleep because this definitively made her wake up. Finn was calling to her from behind the door. She asked him to wait. Explaining it with something about being indecent. Then she had to actually try and get up and out of bed. As well as finding her tunic and pulling it over her head. Before opening the door, she picked up an iron bolt lying on the floor. With it, she scratched a line on the wall beside the door. It made her feel a little bit better. She then opened the door to greet Finn.

“You look like absolute shit,” Finn said with a shocked look on his face. Rey was too tired to discuss how she looked. Too tired and dizzy.  
“Are you sure you are okay?” He asked her when she didn’t answer. She nodded.  
“No. I’m dizzy and I want to vomit.” She said. The nodding and those words didn’t go together. She realized that. But not in time to make it right.  
“I’ll get you to med-bay.” He said. Then he offered her his arm. She took it, and they started down towards the doctor.  
“You sure you didn’t drink yesterday?” Finn asked, supporting her so that she wouldn’t vomit in the corridor.  
“Yeah. I only dreamed.” She said. Then immediately regretted it. Had she learned nothing yesterday? Something about keeping her secrets secret.  
“I think I hit you harder on your head than we suspected,” Finn said. His guilt was bubbling between them, stinking up the air. It almost made Rey vomit there and then. They made it to the Med-bay, though. Only a handful of resistance fighters saw her struggle to get there. She was going to have to do so much good work to erase that image of her, she thought. She should say that she had been drinking. Normal people did that right? And they got hangovers. People could understand that.

The doctor told Rey she had a concussion. That they were going to give her a mix of some sort of powder and flash a laser gadget thing against her head. They also said other things that her tired ears couldn’t quite absorb. She was then told to sleep. But she couldn’t. She lay in the med bay on one of the stretchers, staring into the ceiling. A part of her wished that they all would just forget about her there. So she could go about her business of doing nothing and being nothing and not mattering in the slightest.


	5. The orchid and the dandelion (POV Kylo Ren)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylos perspective as he receives something and makes a mistake. While preparing to trash Batuu. 
> 
> This chapter has a soundtrack! Because this is was so much easier to write while listening to it.  
> Retro 90's/ early 00's Nightwish Remaster of "Kinslayer". (Though I'm calling it the Kylo track now.)  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CW0iaICV2iY

“The loss of the dreadnought has not been as detrimental to our efforts as we had first thought. We sent The Obtainer to recover the region. The loss of a few fighters is negligible” General Pryde said in his dry monotone. Keeping his mind and intention as direct as possible.  
“Negligible? Not only did we lose a dreadnought and it’s support troops. We directly empowered the rebels with the fighters that they managed to steal.” Hux said. His emotions of displeasure and abhorrence always present to some degree.  
“We can match their fighters a thousand to one. No one cares for a few stolen TIE fighters.” Pryde continued, glaring at Hux as if he was a sticky gum underneath his shoe.  
“That’s not the point, General Pryde. The point is the momentum and morale that they are gaining. While our Supreme Leader has been away searching for magic wands and talismans. Our prison camps have been raided on six different worlds. The resistance has freed terrorists and sympathizers. sympathizers of either the fallen republic. Or the fallen empire…” Hux said, glowering at his current rival. Pryde sneered back at the red-head.  
“When the first order has managed to crush this bug. Then whatever former imperials that don’t respect us now, will.“ Pryde said.  
“Which is why we cannot spend resources to go hunting for ancient ideas and fantasies. Instead we must focus on rooting out their main base. Which our reports claim to be in the vicinity of Blackspire.” Hux finished, giving the whole room a smug smile. 

“I do not care for these reports that your little adoptées have produced. Are you sure you have programmed them that well? That we aren’t walking into a trap? Designed by one of the many defectors that are bleeding from your system? After all, we also received reports of the resistance base being on Endor, on Ajan Kloss and even Tatooine. It’s hard to take this information seriously. The supreme leader is right to search for his sith heritage. With the force on our side, we will find the base. The real one.” Pryde concluded.  
Hux finally turned to look straight at the supreme leader in question. Kylo Ren glared back through his mask. Wishing that he had a nanny of some sort to send them all off to.

“Supreme leader, we must act on these reports now. We cannot let the rebel scum get a foothold, even as far into the outer rim as they have fled.” Hux said. His face blanc and his voice tense like a hyperactive clarinet. Always chirping. Always spitting a new pitiful crumb about another useless detail. Kylo had never cared for what Hux had to say and that had not changed since he sliced his way to power. He knew that Hux couldn’t stand being so ignored. He also knew that Hux, of course, wasn’t loyal. But he was a dog and a whipped dog at that. Kylo might not know much about military strategy or politics, but he knew misery and it felt good to share it. But no matter how many times Hux was abused, he still hung around. Waiting for a chance to strike. A chance to pry the first order from the supreme leaders dying hands. Kylo longed for Hux to try it. So that he could kill him as he failed. It didn’t matter that he couldn’t replace Hux once it had happened. As long as he could close his hands around that gingers throat and watch him slowly turn red, then blue, then completely still.

“The scavenger is supposed to have been there too.” General Pryde stated. Kylo paused at that, feeling his face twitch right along his stiff scar. He made an effort not to turn and look at the man. He was a rather new addition to the First Order. He had been an old supporter of the empire. It was a complicated group. Filled with believers of many different ideas and causes. Some of them, Kylo knew, despised him. Called him a pretender. A weak Vader impression with no real purpose.

And they were right, Kylo thought. Then he clamped down hard on his own trace of thought. He had sought to silence those searing voices inside his head. But they had not died with Han. Nor had they faded with the death of Snoke. They had just changed, become more elusive. They were a part of him that he could never get rid of. He could hear them now, mocking him. About how he failed to be someone, a person. Mocking him for his loneliness, that no matter what he did he always failed to find any type of human connection. They were mocking him for, like a child, desiring to. Even in his dreams, this disrelish followed him. Since joining the knights, since joining Snoke, he didn't have any longterm goals. Things mattered less nowadays, the fate of worlds was details. Lives snuffed out were mere specks of salt spread on a fancy dinner, designed to his tastes. 

As Ben Solo he had been alone on a pedestal, the heritage of the Skywalkers. Someone to measure oneself against, loose, and then blame. So stood Kylo Ren on the same pedestal, as the heritage of Vader. Someone to fear. But still not respected. In his memories, he would see himself failing, at everything. Failing as a son, being sent away. Failing at becoming a jedi, sacrificing his friends to the dark. Failing at becoming a sith, hesitating to kill his father, his mother. He had failed in being a machine. In the end, being cut down by the girl, a nobody. Sometimes the harsh voices wore her face, the scavenger. She who had remained herself. So sure, immaculate, no matter the tremendous injustice she suffered. Rey. Her name hurt enough to make him flinch, even to think about. It didn’t matter that he had tried to walk circles around the idea of her before. Calling her other things. Creating distance. She was still the searing image of salvation, as well as everything that he hated. She was the perfect child that his parents would have wanted. Strong where he was weak. Beautiful where he was ugly. He hated her, he thought. For being what she was. Seemingly incorruptible. And he longed for her, here, at his side. Someone to give him rest, someone to silence the conflict that constantly burned in him. He hated himself for that weakness. Hated himself for letting it show. Show enough for someone dangerous like General Pryde to notice that she, in some capacity, mattered to him. 

“Give me the full report.” The supreme leader commanded. 

-

The decision had been made. The ship was on its way to the outer regions. According to Hux reports, that’s where he’d find the nest of his mother's true family. The one she’d chosen. It was fine, he had chosen too. Like Luke had chosen. Like the girl had. Holding out her hand to him. Pretending, while looking at him with that longing expression. So deadly, and so beautiful. Among all the nameless faces he had massacred. She was the only one that had the power to force him to pause and remember that they where people. But that pause brought a crippling guilt with it that he didn’t think that he could survive. So he avoided it. At every cost, he would keep swinging his saber at the world. It would bleed as he did.

Kylo raised his saber and brought it down over the droid. It squeaked like a mouse as it was cut into two pieces, then more. Then it was a pile of scrap metal on the floor of his gym. Sweat was running across his forehead, dripping into his eyes. They stung, from the salt. From the lack of sleep. He would wake up in the middle of the night. Howling. He knew he yelled and whimpered like a cripple because he would make himself wake because of it. 

He would remember snippets of his dreams. Remembering too much of them. He would see Luke and the temple, burning. An accident. Or was it on purpose? He could not remember exactly what had happened when it erupted into a ball of flame. Only that at the time he had been horrified. He would remember, facing the students afterward. He remembered the bloodshed that had followed. He would dream of his father. The few memories he had of him, as he was a child. It all ended with him falling. He’d dream of the scavenger too. Sometimes kind and loving, her body hot and close. An embarrassing fantasy. Sometimes he dreamed that they fought, and she killed him. Sometimes he killed her. And he would awaken with her ashen and cold body present in his mind for days on end.  
“Send in another,” Kylo commanded. The server running the facility processed his order. Then another sparring droid rolled in. They didn’t make much of an opponent. But they filled the purpose of tiring him out.  
“Supreme Leader. The knights have reported in.” The droid chirped, just as Kylo was ready to start cutting it down too.

He switched off his saber and went to get his towel. He wiped his face on it and muttered to the droid that the Knights should be brought up to him. 

The whole gang sauntered into the gym. Six black-clad brawlers with heavy blades and a slight sense for the dark side of the force. The contention was thick in the air.  
“So?” Kylo said. Crossing his arms over his chest. Things had changed between them since he had become the supreme leader. They had expected him to elevate them as well. But instead, he had kept them doing what they already were. Searching for sith and jedi artifacts. Trying to piece together a grasp on the force and the knowledge about it. Sometimes he would let them sink their fangs into opposition villages or cities, looking for resistance members. It filled the purpose of sating their bloodthirst, as well as helping to root out spies in the order. Which, In turn, had become a bigger problem than ever before. Kylo didn’t know who was betraying him. He didn’t care. He expected most of the people in the first order to be doing it in some capacity. To be self-serving first and foremost. Which is why he had to make an example of every individual traitor that he could get his hands on. To keep them fearing him and his dark knights. 

That had not been their most recent mission, though.  
“We have the artifact.” “It speaks in a shy but cruel voice.” “It was hard to come by.” They all spoke with gloating satisfaction. One reaching into a pack and fetching a satchel. They handed it over, and he had to clip his saber to his belt before opening it. He stuck his gloved hand in and picked up a black pyramid-shaped holocron. It whispered to him of dark truths and well-kept secrets. Feeling for it in the force, focusing on it. He found a piece of what he had been looking for. Lessons of connection. Of the force as a web. As a knot. The nature of a dyad in the force and ideas about what it could mean for those entwined.  
“What does it say?” One of the knights asked, looking intently at it.  
“It speaks of the sith. The rule of two. And other ideas of organization of people.” Kylo said. It was a half-truth.  
“Will we make use of it?” They asked. Kylo nodded.  
“Yes. But I will have to spend more time reading it. In the meantime. We will deal with this supposed resistance base on Batuu. Ready yourselves for that battle. I will call on you when the time is right.” Kylo said. Dismissing his knights. He decided that he’d had enough training for the evening. Now he had something else to distract himself with. A way out of his torment. Or a way to use it. To manipulate the bond, to finally turn her to him. 

-

He took his price back into his quarters. He paced forth and back amid his other artifacts. A collection that he had managed to expand during his time as supreme leader. He needed answers. He no longer had a master, but somewhere in the world there was a solution for his torment. A truth stored away, hidden from him by hypocritical censorship of people like Luke. Or his mother. Or the Jedi. Or some other order. In the history of the world, they had been many. This holocron was of sith origin. He recognized the runes on the side. He would have to find a way to translate them later. He didn’t know the sith language. He focused his attention on the holocron. Let it whisper it’s secrets into his mind. 

“So… is it time for that savage onslaught that you promised me?” Reys voice rang in a tired and sarcastic tone. The words slithered their way to him, covered in poison. The room seemed to shrink, making her presence that much more intense. He hadn’t seen her in so long. Hadn’t felt a smudge of her since she kept those walls so high and mighty. A mocking provocation to him. He would sometimes try to break through. Launching himself like an animal straight into that cold iron. It never worked. And it always made him feel small and dirty afterward. He bit down on his lip, making a great effort to hide those shameful moments from her.  
“No. I have other plans.” He answered. His voice came out tired and sad, even though the modulator on his helmet. He regretted that he could not hide it better. He could see her swallow, nervously. He felt too hot and too cold at the same time. His uniform cutting into him. Sitting too tight around his tired arms. He had to look at her, with her flawless face and enthusing eyes that always drew him in. Her shoulders had become stronger. Her arms and legs more defined. She had been training hard. To strike him down, with all her fierce power. If only she’d decided differently. Way back then when they were fighting together. Filling him with that glorious feeling of being completely invincible. Of being whole. 

“When I offered you my hand, you wanted to take it.” He said before she could speak again. Her eyebrows immediately knitted together into her frown. The one that made his hands and feet jump with some sort of energy he hadn’t figured out yet.  
“Why didn’t you?” He asked. It was hard to say the words. He didn’t want to hear the wrong answer. He didn’t want to be burned by another lie. He could feel her thoughts. They whispered to him, as the holocron had done. Except her voice was sweet. It felt warm and tempting. But with an edge to it that seemed unpredictable. She thought of why he was asking such a question. She could feel him too. Feel how he had been struggling with this. Feel how he had been thinking of this way more than he would like to admit. He felt his face getting hotter the more she prodded his memories. She was struggling too. Struggling to admit anything that didn’t suit her. It angered him. How she was justifying her actions with lies. She had just been angry, she thought. She had just been stuck in the moment, she reasoned. She had never wanted to actually take the offer. 

“You wanted to.” He repeated. Pushing the image of herself at her. The one that he kept dear in his memory, even though it hurt. Of him wrestling with himself to get the words out, to make the offer. Of the look on her face, when he had. The look in her eyes that had made him hope that yes, maybe she would close that distance. Because there was a part of her that longed for belonging in the same way that he did. A part of her that sought nothing more than to find an end to her loneliness. He felt her answer, the image of her harrowing pain as she had fooled him. And called for the saber instead. The heavy breaths she took as she stood over his knocked-out body. How it had made her feel cold and broken to leave him there.  
“You know why.” She said. He did know. But he didn’t want to hear it. He didn’t agree. She was wrong. It made his anger rise in him, slowly simmering.  
“You would have hurt me.” She said. He had threatened her over and over. Yes. But he didn’t mean it, not if she’d find another way. Which he wanted, desperately. They would find another way.  
“Why didn’t you take mine?” She said. Cutting off whatever response he had planned for her. It was pathetic, she knew why he couldn’t go back, it was obvious. He wouldn’t let her deflect.  
“You can’t hide, Rey. Not from me.” He said. He tried to make the words soft, sympathetic. But he could hear the threat in there too. But she was the one to humiliate him, to cut him out. He had been the one to try and talk. She was wrong to try and push him away when they where so clearly connected. 

Her body tensed up, not in fear but in anger. He could feel it. She was reaching for him again, feeling for his thoughts. He tried to keep the walls tight but he felt it all bleed away into her greedy hands.  
“Oh? I see through the cracks in your mask. You’re haunted.” She whispered with a deadly sharp edge to her voice.  
“You can’t stop seeing what you did. To your father. To your…” she continued. He pushed back, drowning out her acid words. He could see her scratching the line on her wall. Could experience and recognize her feeling of worthlessness. Of sorrow. Could see her flailing against it.  
“Do you still count the days since your parents left? Such pain in you. Such anger.” He said. Her anger was indeed rising. It was overtaking her body, every muscle tense with the will to lash out against him.  
“I don’t want to have to kill you.” He continued. He hoped that she would listen. That she would choose to back down.  
“I’m going to find you, I’m going to turn you to the dark side.” He said. He could hear how pathetic it sounded. But she had to turn, he had to find a way. He kept that desperation locked away deep inside, at least succeeding in hiding that much from her.  
“Look at yourself. Beneath that mask. At the cuts I put there.” She said in a cold voice that sent a chill down his spine.  
“If I would turn, why do you think you’d survive it?” She finished. Every piece of her a blade, longing to cut him right open.  
“When I offer you my hand again, you’ll take it.” He said. Whispering, not acknowledging her anger. He would not be moved, he would be cold. Colder than her.  
“We’ll see.” She said. Hissing. 

He could feel the connection easing. Already she was slipping away. He wasn’t ready when she suddenly sprang into action and flung her hand out to claw the holocron from his grasp. He had forgotten that he was even holding it. She was gone. So was the holocron. He stood there. Looking at his empty hand. Then he knotted it together in a tight fist, feeling the tide rise through every vein, every little capillary element. He screamed in fury and agony as he punched straight into the wall, crushing it and his knuckles with it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you haven't realized it yet, The green planet that Rey is practicing on in the beginning of TROS, I replaced it with Batuu. Because I feel like it would matter more to the characters since they actually care about that place specifically. 
> 
> (Batuu is the planet where the resistance new base is, and it is this theme that Disney based its amusement park on. Blackspire outpost and the ancient ruins on Batuu. Hm but I haven't actually been there, so I'm guessing that some of you know this better than me XD.)


	6. Spiderwebs (POV Multi)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose composes, with her friends, a response to the First Order mobilization that is threatening their new base.  
> Rey is trying to find a way to use the holocron. 
> 
> This chapter has another soundtrack! - Meadows of Heaven https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AY9VI2B71bk

Two weeks. That’s how long they had their peace on the base. Then the First Order was showing increasing activity on the planet. First, they were looking for resistance members in general. Stopping and interrogating people seemingly at random. One transport had been lounging in orbit. Probably reasoning that the order would think them an ordinary piece of scrap metal. It hadn’t been enough to save them. The order attacked everything from unknown, abandoned ships, and unidentifiable smugglers crib. The longer the order stayed, the finer the combs of their comb grew.  
That’s when the resistance had received another message from their spy in the first order. The first order believed to have found their base. And they were going to launch a an invasion. The 709th Legion had been dispatched. And the supreme leader himself would join them. Pausing whatever thing he had been doing before. When they first heard that transmission, for a moment there was a creeping panic spreading in the CIC. No one dared speak. Then Leia cleared her throat.

“Scrub the message of anything leading back to our source. Then transmit it to the whole planet and everything orbiting it.” Leia said. That broke the spell of their paralysis. Rose wanted to ask any of the many questions that were running through her head. But Poe beat her to it. Always so hot-headed. Still acting first and thinking after… even if he had made some progress.  
“Why, It’ll just spread panic?” Poe said. He spread his arms out wide.  
“At least ask them to stand with us. Tell them that we will fight for them if they fight for us.” Rose said. Even though she could imagine quite a few ways that would turn awry. She wanted to give it a shot.  
“Ask a disorganized world of smugglers, unfortunate refugees, and criminals to die for us? When we are the reason the planet is being targeted in the first place? No, we can’t do that. It incentives them to infiltrate then betray us.” Leia explained. 

Rose felt the energy in her body spark, the will to fight for what felt right. She jumped up on her feet and stepped forward in their little group, that wasn’t so small anymore. They had been a mere handful of resistance fighters leaving Crait. Now, almost a year later, they were an actual organization again with hundreds of members. The CIC grew from five people leading the resistance to about thirty, rotating. Keeping their intelligence processing going. Keeping the logistics running to keep them from starving. They had their soldiers, their pilots, mechanics. Weapon technicians. What they sorely lacked were their higher connections. It had become very dangerous to openly defy the First Order. Meaning that their political allies had fallen silent. Leia argued that they still believed, still supported the Resistance. But their tongues were tied. Things they would have gotten away with during the empire era would be deadly today.  
“So say nothing. If they won’t join us…” Poe said again. Leia held out her hand towards him, silencing him.  
“Say nothing and they will be completely unprepared. The first order will not waste time trying to differentiate between them and us. Inform them and a few will remember that we gave them the chance to flee in time. They will spread the word. And a few might join us. And a few might try and sell us out.” Leia said.  
“But there will be violent chaos,” Poe said.  
“There is chaos because we have no leaders because the first order killed them, and we have no way to lead the people on this world to safety right now either. There is already chaos Poe. People are already dying because of it.” Leia finished. 

Well, that settles it, Rose thought. There wasn’t anything else to be said. That’s when she heard Finn, of all people, chirp in. In a joyous sarcasm that was difficult to place.  
“It’s going to be wonderful to be hearing on every channel everywhere. How the resistance uses the civil population of neutral worlds. As living shields against the First order.” Finn said. Then he laughed. Rose raised her eyebrows. He seemed serious in his critique. But it was a very straightforward and rude way to put it, even if said with a joke. 

“So what do you suggest?” Leia said. Her tone was very sharp and raspy.  
“A very loud and flashy diversion,” Finn said. Now Leia was raising her eyebrows too. They didn’t get it. But Rose did, she thought. She closed her fist in front of her and cried out. Everyone turned to stare at her, even Finn seemed surprised.  
“The Company!” Rose exclaimed. Her hands falling open in front of her. It didn’t help. People were only looking between themselves, trying to figure out if they individually didn’t get it or if the fault lay with Rose. She cleared her throat and put her hands back behind her back instead. Straightening herself.  
“We’ve had reports of a Company, like a hundred soldiers or so, of former stormtroopers on Pasaana. We’ve been scouting the world for weeks, but we haven’t been able to make contact. The intelligence seems good, though. Since the first order is there too, trying to sniff something out.” Rose explained.  
“That Something being this Company?” Poe asked, nodding towards her. Rose pointed toward him, happy that someone at least started to get it.  
“Yes. Exactly.” Rose said.  
“A whole Company of former troopers would make a good distraction indeed,” Finn said. Nodding and chuckling.  
“But how will we find them? If we’ve been looking for so long and not succeeding.” Poe asked. Rose sighed. Yeah, that was the issue, wasn’t it?  
“We might need another diversion in order to recruit people into our bigger diversion… and we need it to happen fast.” She said. Feeling the hope that she had felt grow starting to shrink away again.  
“We will send Rey.” Leia said. 

Rose flinched. Rey. Rose didn’t even know where she was. Lately, she had been acting strangely and reclusive. But yes, everyone knew that the First order was hungry for her. That the supreme leader wanted her hunted down no matter what. They had talked about it a few days ago. Of the transmissions coming in on media everywhere. All controlled by the first order of course. All spoke of the hunt for the murderer of Snoke. The traitor to the first order. The scavenger terrorist. The Jedi pretender. The whatever. They had joked about how only the dearest of children had many names. But the joke didn’t seem to get her to perk up quite as Rose had hoped.

Rose knew what it was to grow up poor, to be used and abused. But she at least grew up with her sister. Rey had grown up completely alone, isolated. Far away from the world. Rose didn’t know exactly what Rey knew about the world and what she didn’t. Her background meant severe holes in her education. But then again Rey was intelligent, curious, dedicated. So she learned very fast. It was a skill that Rose could see others envy. So Rose had explained how the First order needed to paint Rey in a bad light. Discredit all that she stood for. By doing that, they didn’t have to listen to anything she had to say. Rey hadn’t known that much about propaganda. But she understood the base concept of lying for personal gain. Rey had asked then, why so many seemed to believe these stories. Instead of questioning the supreme leader. His issues were so clear and easy for anyone to see. Rose hadn’t been able to think of much to say about that. At least not anything that would help her friend feel better. Because people were dumb? Because the truth was hard to find sometimes?  
Rose always made an effort to support the young Jedi. But, it wasn’t enough. Whatever was going on with her, Rose thought that a mission such as this would do Rey good. If they succeeded. 

-

Rey sat on the warm grass. Breathing hard. Her body was alight. She felt ready to run a marathon. To climb the highest mountain. Yet all she could do was sit there, and stare at the little black pyramid laying on the grass in front of her. She couldn’t believe that she’d dare snatch it from his grasp like that. It felt like such a crazy risk to take. But, she had seen them described in her books. Holocrons. Information stored in objects, much like this one. She recognized it in his hand. Heard it whisper with gentle voices. And she had felt him for so long now, searching for something in the force. Pushing at her walls. And she knew why now. She dared to admit it. The connection had been growing stronger. It must be affecting him, constantly pushing at him. No real privacy. None of that sweet solitude that they both had always hated, but that now seemed desirable to some extent. But this wasn’t better, was it? He had to find a way to end it. Either turn her or end her. Before it drove them both crazy. And though she did strive for the same with him. She couldn’t let him gain the upper hand. 

But the holocron was sinister. She dared not touch it. Dared not meditate over it even. It had taken her days to find the courage to even try. She had failed to calm herself down enough to reach it. She could feel the dry traces of tears crackle in the lines around her eyes. The frustration was getting to her. She needed help. But who could she ask? If she told Leia, then she’d also have to admit how she got the holocron in the first place. She’d have to admit to her that the connection to her son was growing stronger, not weaker. It felt like a defeat. One that Leia would mourn. And right now, Rey wasn’t so sure that they could take more of that. Since the first order was on their way to destroy them all and all that. She had to try something else. She had to do it fast. 

Closing her eyes. She breathed in through her nose, out through her mouth. Counting down from ten. Slowly, her breaths grew longer. Her heart grew calmer, and the aggressive energy in her body dissipated. She felt the force around her. It flowed, in her and out into the life surrounding her. Life sparkling everywhere, small animals. Trees. Flies. Birds. Ants. It grew in her, like veins feeding her light, and flowing back out into the planet itself. She felt the hold of gravity lessen. Weightless she leaned back, floating, safe in the nature that embraced her. She whispered into the ether. Trying to call for them. Spirits, ghosts. Something Leia had mentioned. Someone to guide her in this. Someone to keep her safe from the dark. So she could approach it but still have a lifeline to pull her back. But No ghosts showed their faces to her. No legendary figure answered her call.

Gently she reached for the ancient object, whispering a different tune. But the voice felt smaller now, less threatening as it was so engulfed in the grace of nature.  
“Life is in me. Light is in me.” She answered the whispers. They kept going. She could almost hear them. She could almost understand what they were saying. If she would only come closer. And listen more carefully. She felt the threes around her. Saw their greatness stretching to unimaginable heights. She saw them petrify into stone. Saw their smaller cousins aspire to grow beyond them and failing. She felt their longing, for the water in the ground. For the birds to keep them company, and spread their seeds. She felt the chicks in the three, longing for their parents to come and bring them worms. She felt the worms in the ground longing for the chick to test its wings, fail, and to fall down dead. No one satisfied, all always striving, slaves to their fate. There was balance, but no rest except death. When the time came. All were connected, in a web of threads and knots. She felt how close they where, like she could pluck them. And hear them sing their bittersweet tune. 

Rey opened her eyes. She looked up in the sky and saw it covered in thick ash and thunder. She saw the birds fall from the sky. She saw the threes burn into cinder. She saw the worms nestle in millions in the hot dust. She saw them thrive until they had eaten the last leaf, the last carcass. She saw them beginning to eat each other. Until there was only one fat worm left. Until it shriveled up into a dry twig. Then all was death. She saw the strands in the force shrink, saw the knots succumb to the dark. A small cold voice wiggled its way into her ear. There it swelled into a deep and booming voice that would not be ignored.  
“Passion is Key. Passion is sustenance to the fire. But the fire burns alone.” It said. She didn’t like the words. They seemed cruel, and final. 

Someone called her name. Rey blinked, the bright sky came back to her. It wasn’t him, the one she had gotten used to expect. It was a brighter voice. Finn. She relaxed and reached out with her feet, searching for the ground. She found her balance and captured the holocron as it fell.

“Sorry to disturb your floating.” Finn said. As he walked up to her, he caught a glimpse of the strange object she held in her hand. Rey cursed internally, for not putting it away immediately.  
“What’s that?” Finn said. Pointing to the holocron. It seemed like he couldn’t take his eyes off it. Was he hearing it whisper to him too? What was it saying to him? She was tempted to hand it over. But she couldn’t risk her friend. She didn’t know if the holocron actually posed a risk or not.  
“It’s ah….” Rey said. Hesitating. She hadn’t really prepared an explanation yet.  
“It is like it is more somehow. More than a box,” Finn said. Stepping closer, only to stop inches in front of her. Preparing to poke the holocron with a tentative finger.  
“It’s a sith holocron.” Rey said. Choosing to go the clear and easy route.  
“Okay,” Finn said. Then he tore his eyes from the pyramid, and looked straight at her, raising one eyebrow. She couldn’t find anything else to say.  
“So… where did you find it?” Finn asked. Raising his other brow too.  
“Err. I stole it… I don’t really know from where.” Rey answered. She heard the strangeness of her words. How she was digging that grave deeper and deeper. She was a horrible person and she was going to die screaming in shame, she thought.  
“Okay,” Finn said. Nodding in a slow tempo. Then he pointed to the holocron again.  
“Can we talk about it while walking back? Because I have something important to tell you.” Finn said.  
“Yes. Tell me!” Rey said. And turned towards the path back to the base again. 

“We need to go to Pasaana. Like right now.” Finn said. Shaking his head.  
“Pasaana? Why? No, the first order is about to hit this place hard. We can’t leave. People expect me to stand with them here.” Rey protested.  
“Yes but you see, that’s the point. We need to create a diversion. Confuse the enemy. Force them to divide their forces and not destroy us completely. Wait… I still want to know what’s up with that scary thing you had there.” Finn said.  
“Wait, what do you mean diversion? The first orders fleet is massive. Why would it matter if we tried to create a diversion? They’d have enough ships and soldiers to fight both battles.” Rey said.  
“Yeah. Maybe. But they are only sending one legion. The ultimate legion, true… And the supreme asshole will be with them. But they will have to split up. Or… wait. Again. The thing.” Finn said, pointing to the holocron as Rey was putting it into her satchel that she then hung across her chest.  
“It’s a holocron. It speaks through the force. It tells you things… I don’t know the details.” She said.  
“But… you said you stole it. From where? How? I don’t understand. Was that thing really hiding here somewhere?” Finn asked. Still confused. Of course he was. Because she wasn’t making any sense.  
“I saw him again. Not by my own will. Nor his. I think it was accidental.” She said. Her voice falling into a low mumble. Finn nodded. He had learned whom the _he_ was when she spoke in that manner.  
“He was holding this holocron in his hand. And so I grabbed it. Before the connection closed.” She said. Finn's mouth fell open. A look that her connection to the Supreme leader seemed to summon rather easily.  
“You can do that? Grab him? Or grab stuff around him? From across the universe?” Finn asked.  
“I… I couldn’t before. Grab stuff. I think. I haven’t tried to grab him. Or hit him. I only tried to shoot him. The first time it happened. But that didn’t work. But, It feels like something has changed. Like he is easier to find. Easier to hold on to. So I thought it was worth a try.” She explained.  
“What does that mean though? That he is easier to find… to hold on to.” Finn said, repeating her words back to her. She could hear his point in them.  
“I don’t know. I want to know. Which is why…” Rey said and patted her satchel with the palm of her hand. Finn was quiet for a few beats then. She could feel his mind racing. His eyes bouncing between invisible objects that he was visualizing.  
“So he wants to know too… if he had that. And it says something about it.” Finn said. Looking away, into the bushes. As if he could feel that the issue was hard for her to talk about. And he wanted to give her some space.  
“I don’t know if it has much to say about… us. The way we are. I don’t really understand what it has to say actually.” Rey said.  
“So… do you think he will follow? If you turn up at Pasaana?” Finn said, letting the subject slide a bit. She thought about it for half a second. But she didn’t really have to though. She knew. She just didn’t like it.  
“…Yes.” Rey said.  
“Do you think he will be mad? About the holocron thing?” Finn asked. That was even easier to answer.  
“Yes. For sure.” She said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a calmer one. The calm before the storm, one could even call it. 
> 
> Do you like the switching of perspectives, or should I keep it to only one? 
> 
> IF you like it, please give me a kudos or a comment. Response is always awesome. <3


	7. Stand for the Stalwart (POV Multi)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> \- soundtrack: Amaranth - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdZn7k5rZLQ
> 
> The friends face some truth, and make a bypass to Kajimi. But they are hunted.

“I have to go with her!” Finn said. Poe was shaking his head. Preparing to give him a saucy excuse to leave one of his best and oldest friends behind. Or, letting her leave him behind… depending on how one viewed it. The little word-wrestle distracted Finn enough to make him miss his chance to keep his initiative.  


“We need you here too,” Poe said. Finn nodded again. Not sure whom the _we_ were in this statement. _We_ had been struggling with our place in the resistance. As Leia's health was fading, _we_ felt the pressure on our shoulders. _We_ didn’t like to be alone in those situations.  


“And I need you to come with me,” Finn said. Nodding. Poe turned to look over his shoulder, back at the resistance base. In their hectic mobilizing efforts, people were running around like crazy. Finn could sense his thoughts, something rather new. He backed away from that. It felt wrong to intrude. Even to help. And Poe didn’t know. And right now he was busy worrying. Would they be alright? Was there something else he could do to help their efforts? Was this the right decision? Or was this simply Poe, wishing that things could be simpler again. To just be able to sit himself down in that pilot's chair and do his thing. No more no less. Finn sighed. People were so complicated sometimes. 

“Hold up, I’m coming with you!” called Rose. Finn saw her run across the yard towards the millennium falcon. She had a big and heavy-looking bag of what he thought must be tools in her hands. Finn hurried up to her, trying to help the rather small woman with her too-large bag.  


“Surely Leia needs you…” Poe started, his hands on his hips. Finn shot him a judging eye, but Poe only raised his eyebrows and stared harder at Rose. Determined to ignore any critique.  


“Yeah for sure she does, but you are taking the millennium falcon on a critical mission. And Rey won’t be able to keep it running on its own in its current condition. So now you need me more than Leia does.” Rose explained while trying to balance her side of the bag up the ramp. Finn and Rose worked their way up into the loading bay of the ship.  


“What is in there and where do you need it?” Finn asked. Huffing and puffing to catch his breath.  


“Tools. Here will be fine, in the back. Just put it down.” Rose said.  


“If you can come, I’m glad that you would,” Finn said before Rose would run off again. She had the tendency to do that. Ever since waking up on the falcon, after her crash on Crait. After reaching for him and seeing him draw back. A few months of him avoiding her. Then a difficult conversation. That yes, he did care for her. But not in that way. That he felt confused. He wanted to feel that way for her. Because she was amazing. But he just didn’t. It had been like ripping off a band-aid. He felt instantly better. She’d said that she needed time. And he had given it to her. But tried to remain her friend. It was a very difficult balancing act.  


“Of course I’d help,” Rose said. Then they heard Poe cackling outside again. They both turned to look down the ramp. Familiar shadows moved across the forest ground.  


“Jump in C3P0!” Rey chirped. Nervous and obviously avoiding the critical attention she was getting from Poe.  


“We don’t need him too! We already have BB-8 on board!” Poe said. Rey continued up the ramp with C3P0 in tow.  


“I need him for something,” she said in a calm manner while smiling up at Finn and Rose.  


“Mm-Mh you need him? Of course you do. Everyone needs something.” Poe muttered. Rey gave Finn a knowing look. Rose shook her head.  


“I’m going to go help Chewie with the flight checks,” Rose said and ran off towards the cockpit.  


“Get your ass in here and let’s go!” Finn called to Poe. Rey turned to go up towards the cockpit too. That’s when Finn remembered. He had to ask her. She must have felt something because she stopped and turned to look at him.  


“Rey. I have to tell you something.” He said. Rey looked straight into his eyes, studying his face.  


“Later! You get to tell her later! Let’s go!” Poe deadpanned and slipped past them, grabbing Finn by the arm on his way. 

-

“I’m going to fix something in the back. C3P0, will you help me?” Rey said to everyone collected around the chessboard. The autopilot was on. The engines were roaring as stable as it ever would without a major overhaul. She could find the time now, to have a look at the holocron again. Rose was cleaning some extra filters, to make sure they had good air even if the current ones failed. Finn was running around, trying to be useful and failing. Poe was sulking next to chewie, nibbling his nails down to the nailbed.  


“Oh, really? You can’t fix whatever needs fixing here, with us.” Finn said. Rey's mouth fell open. His tone was a little bit irritated. She stared back at him. Didn’t he remember her wish? That he would keep this a secret. But then again, he had agreed to keep her connection to Kylo Ren a secret. He never said the same of the holocron.  


“Aeh…” Rey said. Struggling. She had not even considered the chance that Finn might disagree with her decision to keep the information private.  


“If she needs a break then let her have it,” Rose said. Putting the filters down.  


“Yeah but… not when it affects all of us.” Finn said. Then he was looking away from her, crossing his arms over his chest. He was ashamed for putting her on the spot. She could feel that. But he also believed that he was doing what was right. Rey felt her cheeks beginning to flame. With shame and frustration.  


“Wooo guys… what is going on?” Poe said, stepping forward. Stopping as he stood between her and Finn. He looked between them. But Rey didn’t feel like talking to him. She didn’t want to talk to any one of them at all.  


“It does… NOT… have anything to do… with you.” Rey said. She was angry. She shouldn’t be. It slipped into her voice and her posture. She had to breathe. Had to calm down. She didn’t want to be angry with her friends. They were not the source of her pains and frustrations. They didn’t deserve this. But they were looking at her now, she felt. With doubt. Instead of the trust she could usually cherish. Trust had a price, she remembered that now. She should not be afraid to pay it. 

She reached for her satchel and the holocron in it. She pulled it out and held it out for everyone to see. They all hunched closer, trying to catch a peek at the pyramid-shaped object.  


“What is that?” Rose asked. Looking very surprised.  


“I cannot believe that we’re actually arguing over a paper-weight,” Poe said, inspecting the holocron. Rey looked at Finn, sending him a look that said: see, they don’t get it. They don’t need to know. Finn only shook his head and cleared his throat.  


“It’s what Kylo Ren has been looking for,” Finn said.  


“Kylo Ren has lost his paper-weight? Damn, we better send it back to him before he destroys us all.” Poe said, still not impressed.  


“It’s not ah. Force, Will you tell him Rey?” Finn said, frustrated. 

Rey tried to explain the purpose of a holocron, but in the end, she didn’t feel like she knew enough.  


“So it has got a lesson stored in it somehow. And you have to feel it to learn it?” Rose said.  


“Yeah, maybe. Or just information. About the sith and their ways.” Rey said.  


“So why do you think the first order is interested in this thing?” Poe asked. Rey shook her head. What could she say? What was true and what was only her fears or hopes?  


“I don’t think the first order is interested in it. I think this is something that only interests its supreme leader.” Rey said.  


“Uhu. Because he wants to explore the dark side and shit like that.” Poe said.  


“Exactly. I need to know what it contains.” Rey explained.  


“Isn’t that dangerous? To let sith-magic speak to you.” Rose asked. Rey nodded.  


“Yes. But I’ve been very careful so far. And I just need to know enough to understand him. Not it. I need to know why he needs this.” Rey tried to explain. She didn’t want to mention that the holocron contained information about their connection. 

“Okay.” Finn said, and snatched the holocron from her fingers. He tossed it over to C3P0, whom barely managed to catch it. Rey thought her heart might burst right out of her chest watching him struggle with the grasp.  


“Oh. Yes. Splendid.” C3P0 exclaimed happily. 

“And? What does it say?” Finn said. Tense with expectation.  


“I am afraid I cannot tell you,” C3P0 said. Everyone went silent, trying to understand what could be going on now. Poe was the first one to clear his throat and laugh.  


“Twenty four bazillion languages and you cannot read that?” Poe said. Doing a poor job of managing his frustration levels.  


“I have read it sir. I know exactly what this holocron contains.” C3P0 said. Sounding very proud of himself.  


“Unfortunately I am forbidden from translating the runic language of the sith.” C3P0 continued.  


“So what you are telling me… is that the one time when we need you to talk you can’t?” Poe stated bitterly.  


“Irony, sir.” C3P0 said. Rey was shaking her head. Trying to not get too frustrated with the droid.  


“But there must be a way!” Finn said.  


“Sadly master Finn, the translation from a forbidden language cannot be retrieved. That is, short of a complete reductive memory bypass.” C3P0 said.  


“A complete what?” Finn said.  


“It is a terribly dangerous and simple act to perform on unwitting droids by drakes and criminals,” C3P0 said.  


“Let’s do that!” Finn said, happily nodding at the others.  
C3P0 shook at the suggestion.  


“Rose?” Finn asked, looking to her.  


“Sorry, it’s not something I know,” Rose said. Shaking her head. Rey felt her hopes fall. Would she be forced to plunge into that holocron after all? She wished that if she had to do it, that she could have done it back on Batuu, where she felt strong. Where she felt safe. Where Leia was and could aid her if she dared ask for it.

“I know a black market droidsmith,” Poe said.  


“Black market droidsmith!” C3P0 exclaimed.  


“But he’s on Kajimi,” Poe said.  


“What’s on Kajimi?” Finn asked.  


“I had a little bad luck on kajimi.” Poe said.  


“How long would it take to do this?” Rose asked.  


“It depends. I haven’t been there for a long time.” Poe said.  


“Oh give it a guess,” Finn said.  


“A day?” Poe said. Raising his shoulders.  


“Really?” Finn said.  


“Maybe a few hours, I don’t know,” Poe said. 

“Rey is this worth it?” Rose asked. Looking for a serious and honest answer. Rey hesitated.  


“It’s hard to say. Some holocrons are supposed to be so expansive. But some are not. And, from what I know… which isn’t much… the point of them is what’s on the inside, not the outside.” Rey said. She looked away from her friends in shame. She should say more. Say something. But it was so hard. She would much rather smile at them. And reserve her anger for their enemies. Crash down on anything that was threatening her friends, threatening innocent people. She would much rather listen to the problems of others. Put a comforting hand on their shoulder. But trying to talk about her own problems, that was hard. Telling them about what it had been like, growing up alone. And the fear that it brought with it. Telling them about why she feared her connection to Kylo Ren, Ben Solo… how could she even begin to explain that?  


“Then why do you even need to know?” Rose asked. Looking confused. That’s when Rey heard Finn whisper a sorry across the force. Immediately she looked up at him, panicked. No, he wouldn’t. He just couldn’t. She wanted to grab him in the force, shut his mouth and inhibit him from speaking. But she held back. And let him destroy everything.  


“It’s because Kylo Ren wants her to turn. He can reach into people's minds. Make them see and feel things. Rey is afraid to lose her way if he or his ways get too close to her.” Finn said. He was looking between Rose and Poe, not at her. He must feel her though, glaring at him.  


“Ah Rey, why didn’t you say something? I’ve felt that myself. I understand.” Poe said, his frustration washed away completely. His memory was lost in a dark moment. Rey could see a black, masked figure, escape from Poe's memories. She shook her shoulders, blocking it out. It made her feel way too similar to their shared monster. To be able to see something so private and painful in someone else, without their permission.  


“I just want to know, all that I can know, without going too deep into it,” Rey said. Still not feeling like facing anyone of them.  


“We’re all in this, till the end,” Finn said. She felt his hand grasp for hers. Then Rose's smaller hand was clasping her other hand.  


“Hands? We’re doing hands?” Poe asked, back to his normal self again.  


“Hands” Finn answered. Rey could see Finn and Poe’s hands clasped together. See Rose and Poe clasp their hands together. And their faces grinning, determined.  


“Kajimi!” Poe said.  


“I’ll radio our scouts on Pasaana.” Rose said.  


“Yeah and I’ll radio HQ,” Poe said.  


“I’ll work on the hyperdrive couplings,” Rey said and put the holocron back in her satchel, then held it out to Finn. She needed to getaway. From them. From him.  


“Here hold this.” She told him.  


“Awesome, I’ll just…” Finn said. Looking at the satchel. And remaining standing there in silence as the others broke their little circle and got back to work.  


“Master Finn, Might I recommend that you put that away.” Rey could hear C3P0 tell him. She shut her mind to them all. 

-

Kajimi was freezing. Rey had never felt such cold before. The people were jaded by First Order raids every day, every night. A feeling of hopelessness and fear had settled over the city. Like a choking mist in the air, as men in long white coats and masked faces came and took their loved ones away. Rey followed after Poe as he led them through the city. They had to sneak their way past both the First Order and old enemies that Poe apparently had on the planet. Rey didn't know what he had done before he had joined the resistance. It had always felt like Poe had always been a member somehow. She couldn’t imagine him doing something else. Rose had remained on the Falcon. Trying to fix the ignition on the hyperdrive that they busted on their way to the planet. Rey felt like she might have broken something too, as Poe kept breaking the ship that she somehow had come to love. It was easier to break stuff when you weren’t the one that had to fix them, she thought. That made her think of a different destructive man. In her mind the red laser flamed alive, then it sang as it cut through iron, as it cut through steel and flesh. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. It made her teeth freeze and she panicked. Thinking she had broken them. But carefully feeling with her tongue, they seemed okay. This climate was not for her.  


“Let’s head this way,” Poe said, sticking his head out behind another building. There he froze. Rey could not see why, but she felt his fear as it grabbed hold of his body.  


“Heard you were spotted at monks gate. Thought. He’s not stupid enough to come back here.” An unfamiliar woman said. Rey tried to sneak up closer to see her. She could only see her golden mask and red suit. And the weapon she was pointing straight at Poe’s head. She could snatch it right out of her hand with the force. But she’d wait. She’d give Poe a chance to handle this himself first. She waited.  


“Oh you’d be surprised,” Poe said.  


“Who’s this,” Finn said, worried.  


“What’s going on.” Rey echoed him.  


“This is ah, Zorii. Zorri this is Rey and Finn…” Poe said.  


“I can pull this trigger right now!” Zorii sneered at Poe. Still, she hadn’t done it. From what Rey could feel from the unknown figure, she wasn’t about to either. No matter what she said.  


“I’ve seen you do worse,” Poe said.  


“…for a lot less” Zorii filled in.  


“Can we just ah… talk about this?” Poe said, carefully turning so he could face the woman threatening him. After some bickering forth and back, Poe got the message across. They needed help and they needed it fast. But they’d wasted too much time. Eyes were falling on Rey, she could feel it. Eyes that recognized her for what she was. She had to act fast, and in a way that didn’t kill all of these people. Strangers that were obviously friends of Poe at least at some point in time.  


“J’kanka!” Zorii commanded.  


“No J’kanka!!” Poe said. Pleading and shaking his head. Rey was ready. She took the first two guys out with a swing of her staff. They thought they had snuck up on them from behind, but they had been wrong - she thought. Zorii herself went down with a sweep to her legs. And the last few fighters she disarmed with a pull in the force. Zorii snatched her gun up and pointed it directly at Rey. But she’d already ignited the lightsaber by then, holding it a few inches from the womans mask. Zorii breathed hard, thinking. Rey could feel the tactics she was working herself through, not finding anyone that would save her in this scenario. Rey could feel the slight panic. She was used to it. She realized, being beaten down. She was like Rey herself. Except she had grown up in icier urban streets. But still, alone. Making her own way. She knew what it was to be stepped upon. To be forced to fight back. Hurt people, that were hurting like her, in order to survive. She knew what it was to do low things while dreaming of big ones.  


“Not that you care. But I think you’re okay.” Zorii said. Rey smiled.  


“I care,” Rey said. And offered the woman her hand. 

-

“The knights of Ren have tracked the scavenger to a planet called Kajimi,” said general Pryde. Kylo Ren held back a sigh of pure contempt.  


“I thought you said she was on Batuu,” Kylo said. His generals joined him as they made their way through the corridor. They were preparing to hit the base, obliterate everything on that crappy planet. He didn’t need to hear something new now. Something about how they needed to change plans. About how he couldn’t do just this one thing, then be rid of this, once and for all. Burn away everything that caused him so much pain in one big movement, while still managing to keep the important bits alive, to be captured. To be turned.  


“The resistance is on Batuu.” Said Hux, joining them as they walked. Kylo felt his patience run out. They needed to get to the hangar, then start the assault, that was it. No more of this.  


“Yes. That’s what your report said.” Pryde said. The discontent between the two growing. He could barely keep them in the same room anymore. It was unbearable.  


“Should we destroy the cities of Kajimi?” Hux said. Kylo could see it in the general's military mind. He could see the bombs launched from orbit over the essential parts of the planet. See the man calculate the time it would take, to dispatch then activate ground forces on the planet. The numbers didn’t add up. Especially not when they had dedicated so much to this invasion of Batuu. His invasion, Hux invasion. Kylo wanted to laugh. This didn’t belong to Hux. It was just another way for the little dog to lap up fantasies of power that he could not touch. The General dreamed of bombing Batuu too, instead of wasting his fine troopers. It would solve the problem and give him, Hux, an effective and violent victory. The planet, burning. Everyone, burning. The resistance obliterated. Leia, burned to a cinder. The scavenger, incinerated. No more annoying insurrection. Only death.  
Kylo raised his finger, silencing the generals and their thoughts. He couldn’t do it. They didn’t know why and they didn’t need to know why. And if Rey had slipped away, to this new planet, he couldn’t bomb that city either. Would he be forced to give it up and not pursue her at all? Risking losing the advantage he’d just achieved. That was unacceptable. He had to do something. They’d have to split their ground troops. He could let most of the 709th legion take Batuu, and he himself could join the knights on Kajimi. Together with pieces of the 709th legion and whatever other troops they could mobilize in that time. It would take days to comb the city, looking for the scavenger. Unless he did it himself. He could feel for her. Sniff her out in hours instead of days. But there was no strategical excuse for that decision, without giving something up. Information on why or how he could find her, and only her, in such a manner. He would have to use fear again, to silence their questions. They deserved it either way, all their time was spent lusting for power and the destruction of people that weren’t worth hating.  


“Supreme leader? What is your command? ” said general Pryde. Kylo hated them both, personally. Hated this.

-

“Babu? Babu only works for the crew. That’s not you anymore” Zorii said. Leading them through the city's back-alleys.  


“So you’re still mad?” Poe said. He did feel guilty for what he had done to her. Guilty for leaving her behind when she had trusted him. She deserved better. But, he felt guilty about so many things by this point. It was difficult to focus on this particular guilt. He needed to get her to give Babu Frick up. Needed her to aid them before he had even more deaths to feel guilty over.  


“You know. I’m still digging out of the hole you put me in when you left to join the resistance.” Zorii said. Poe didn’t really have anything to say. He didn’t have time to stop and think about small fates and personal faults.  


“Zorii. If we don’t stop the First Order. There will be no end to this, ever. We must focus on the right enemy, not tear down each other.” Poe said. He knew it was the wrong thing to say immediately after he’d done it. Zorii stopped dead in her tracks, pointing at him.  


“Eeyh Guys.” Said Finn. Poe turned to look at him. Doing basically anything to distract himself from Zorii.  


“What?” Poe said.  


“I feel something. Something dark.” Rey was whispering, so ominous that Poe almost burst a vessel right then and there. The young Jedi's face were filled with fear and worry.  


“And I see something. Something big.” Finn yelped and pointed up towards the sky. Far away was the outline of a First Order destroyer. By the look of Rey's furious scowl, he didn’t need to ask whom it belonged to.  


“Come in here, with me!” Zorii hissed and jumped into a building guarded by a large masked fellow.  


“How could they find us so quickly?” Finn asked, looking between them.  


“Well you’re stuck now. You need to hide. Try to leave the planet now and you will be found and killed.” Zorii said.  


“Not if we leave immediately. They can’t have managed a full blockade yet.” Poe said. Grabbing Zorii’s arm.  


“Then forget about Babu!” Zoriisaid.  


“Come with us. Bring Babu and I’ll fly you to safety and out of here. Start a new life.” Poe said.  


“Like you?” Zorii scoffed.  


“Yes. Like me. Or Finn. Or Rey. Or… please I’m begging you.” Poe said.  


“Let the past die. Live life for today.” Rey said in an empathic voice. Then her face fell, and she looked down into the floor as if she was about to pass out.  


“Are you okay.” Finn whispered to Rey. Poe didn’t like the look Finn was giving her, but he tried to focus and shut them out. Zorii was thinking it over. He could tell. She reached for the visor on her helmet, raised it, and her clever eyes looked back at him. It had been so long ago since last he had seen them. He smiled weakly. That’s when they were all flung to the floor. The ground was shaking violently, there were glass and broken things all around them. Poe’s ears were ringing. The whole place was covered in dust. Somewhere he heard shots fired and screams and commands.  


“I’ll get Babu.” Zorii said and coughed. She got back up on her feet and ran off into another room. They left for the millennium falcon within minutes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've added POV notes to the chapter titles to make the story easier to navigate. 
> 
> This chapter was a bit hard to make flow. But it was fun. More bare bone dialog in this one than before, but that's because more characters are present in the scenes.  
> If you're longing for more reylo, don't worry, it's coming... like a lot of it. But you know if there is too much of that all the time and no outside perspective, then the good stuff doesn't feel as nice and rewarding.


	8. Pasaana - (POV multi)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> soundtrack: Dark chest of wonders https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvOD6xecph4
> 
> Rey makes mistakes and contemplates the consequences. But she is also inspired by meeting another legendary figure. Finn is sorry, and Poe is stressed out.

“The first order took most of the kidz long ago. Can’t stand the cries anymore,” Zorii said. Her eyes had little wrinkles around the eyes. Poe hadn’t had the time to notice them before. He had thought that he’d had it bad. That it had been better for the ones that stayed on Kajimi. While Poe would burn hard and fast as he joined Leia and her resistance fighters. He’d lost his father early: to the fight. He’d lost his mother. He thought that was how things would continue. He thought his life would mirror Leias. She had lost her son years back. Poe never really knew how. After the Vader thing being public knowledge. Skywalker-stuff became taboo among the resistance fighters. No one wanted to spread gossip that might hurt her. When Poe returned to her, he was like the new son to replace the old. But still, Leia had lost Luke to force magic. She’d even lost her man to a homicidal maniac. It just seemed like Poe’s life would go down the same way. And he was fine with that, he’d thought. However, thinking of the friends and family he had inside spread fear in him. That he would fail them. He could accept death, loss. But not useless, pointless dying.  
He gave Zorii a bump on the arm as she sat next to him by the quad-laser cannons. Rose had sent them down to check the batteries. Make sure that they actually had the ability to shoot something down if it was needed. 

“You’re free from that now. For a moment, at least.” Poe said. Trying to turn her around. Getting her invested in the struggle. 

“Yeah. Sure. My crew and I are stuck with you now. Doesn’t count as much freedom-wise.” Zorii said. She didn’t sound very bitter though. She fished for something in her uniform and held it out to him. A round metal object. He recognized it. It was a First Order captain's medallion. His breath got stuck in his throat as he looked at it and imagined all the open doors it presented. Free passage through any blockade. Landing privileges, any vessel.

“We could get out. Have real freedom.” Zorii said. Poe sighed. 

“I can’t walk out on this war. Not until it’s over.” Poe said. Then he felt how his spirits fell. Even if they could get to Pasaana and find the lost company of First Order Defectors there. That wasn’t a final victory. Even if the First Order tore itself to pieces. It would take a long time until something good could grow out of that power vacuum. He wondered if he’d even see this peace during his own lifetime. 

“Maybe it is over.” He said. Mumbling. He remembered that terrible loss. When they had all been cornered and desperate. And he had been unable to help them. If Rey had been there just a few moments later. It wouldn’t have mattered. They’d be dead. The resistance had been growing these last months but the First Order had too. Had been growing much faster. 

“We sent out a call for help at the battle of Crait. Nobody came. Everyone is so afraid. They’ve given up.” Poe said. It was words that he could not say to the others. Could not admit to those feelings. But to Zorii, he could. He thought of Finn, that crazy man that had jumped at the chance to fight for his freedom. Perhaps just to get away but still, admirable. How he could keep a good mood going even through all this. Poe could not help but feel ashamed. He was supposed to be the leader, but he didn’t understand Rey - their most powerful asset. He couldn’t talk to people like Rose did and he couldn’t inspire as Finn did. So what could he do? 

“Nah I don’t believe that,” Zorii said. Shaking her head. She then punched his arm right back and he knew that she was smiling underneath that helmet. 

“Hey. They win by making you think you’re alone. Remember? There are more of us.” Zorii said. 

“Hey, guys!” Finn yelled. The both of them turned to look at him standing outside the hatch they had climbed down into. Poe saw Finn's face fall into a gloom at the sight of them so snug together. Yes, that was another issue. He should probably talk to Finn about things. Some things. But he was so bad at talking. And Finn was so good at joking. So nothing important ever got said. 

“Are they done?” Zorii asked Finn. 

“Yup, his head is cracked right open,” Finn said. Then he turned and went back into the corridor. Poe starts to climb up after him with Zorii close in tow. 

“Hold up,” Zorii said, grabbing his arm. Poe turned around and almost bumped right into her. She gave him a look. He gave her one back. Then she held out the medallion again and offered it to him.

“I can’t take that,” Poe said. 

“Well, you will,” Zorii said. Then she grabbed his hand and stuffed the medallion into it. She closed his fist around it and gave it a little pat. 

“I have a feeling you will be needing it more than me,” Zorii said. Poe looked at her, feeling a bit sad. He understood now. She’d help them. But not join them. 

-

“Eee-yup Droid is ready,” Said Babu Frik. Then he zapped C3P0. The golden droid's eyes went red, and he stood up. Twisting his head in a very uncharacteristic way from side to side. Rey was holding her breath, waiting to hear what they’d struggled so to find.

“For the passion of the becraved. For the endurance of the bereaved.” C3P0 boomed. Then the droid fell back down onto his chair, and the red lights in his eyes went out. He went still. As did the whole room. With the exception of Babu that cheered as loudly as his small frame could manage. 

“No…” Rey whispered. That couldn’t be it. She clutched her staff close to her, squeezing it hard as she felt her emotion rise. As the tears were collecting in her eyes. 

“What? What does that mean?” Finn said, looking at her. But Rey didn’t look back. She was busy pushing her forehead into a particularly sharp edge on her staff. 

“So it is… for the one that has loved and lost? Or… the one that is loved or… lost or…” Rose said, then she fell silent too.

“My city fell for that?” Zorii said. Crossing her arms over her chest. 

“We don’t know if the city has actually fallen yet. There are still people fighting on Kajimi.” Poe said. Zorii shot him a look, and he gave up on his efforts. 

“Fine!” Poe called, his voice tense and angry.

“What had you expected it to say then?” He said. Rey shook her head. She didn’t want to think about what this had cost them. And what it meant for the next few hours of their lives.

“Let’s just get to Pasaana. We’re only two hours out. We should see to our things.” Rose said. Trying to awaken the group again. 

“Yeah, I’ll check the blasters,” Finn said. He stopped beside Rey and put a hand on her shoulder. She looked at him through pearls of tears slowly making their way down her cheeks. 

“Will you come with me?” he asked. 

“I just have to check something first,” Rey mumbled. Finn hesitated, but let her go. She still remembered how he had betrayed her secrets earlier. It still hurt, and she wasn’t ready to let it go just yet.

-

She didn’t have much time, but if she didn’t look now, then it would be a while before she’d get another chance. She opened the jedi texts and flipped through the pages again. It was hard to remember the details without the aid of C3P0. But she had made some helpful notes. Her writing was terrible, but, according to the others, it was still considered impressive that she knew how to write at all. Since she had learned on her own, searching through old data-packs from outdated classes.  
There it was. The chapter on friendships, love, and connections. A chapter that she’d found very hard to process. It spoke about how it was wrong to cling to whatever was pleasant. Like the friendship of others, because losing them would bring pain. Clinging to unpleasant things was also discouraged, as that too would bring pain. She could understand that. But it was difficult to think of the company that she had gained. Her friends. As something more dangerous for her sanity and balance than the loneliness she had been raised in. The texts went on, stating how affection or lust, love, greed, fondness, delights, desires… all of those things could bring grief, could bring fear. And if one was free from all of that, one would be free from both grief and fear. But, Rey could not imagine what that would even be like. The texts stated that the wise and just would be loved by the world instead. That the force would embrace them, like a friend or a lover, once they passed from this world and into the next. From what little she had heard from the holocron, she knew it had different opinions on this. She had thought that maybe, the jedi texts would explore connections in the force. But it only spoke of knots as something inhibiting. Something to be untangled. Nowhere could she find anything that would steel her from whatever lesson the holocron would try to force on her about the subject. 

“Good news Rey!” called Finn. Rey looked up from her perched position on her bed in the crew's quarters. Finn was standing in the doorway. Looking way too happy. 

“We made contact with our scout again. They’ve found someone. Someone that can bring us to the company leaders. They are at this massive festival. I think you’ll like it.” Finn said. 

“That sounds wonderful Finn,” Rey said and smiled. She didn’t want to bring the mood down when he was trying so hard to cheer her up after that failure with the holocron. But she had to know about Batuu.

“Have you heard anything about the situation on HQ?” Rey asked, gently. Finns smile shriveled away at the question. 

“Well, you know. They have been holding so far. They haven’t been found out, but they are losing a lot of people in the purge that the First Order has launched there. The first order sent the 709th legion so; they are supposed to be these elite soldiers. Handpicked by the supreme leader himself.” Finn said. Then he chuckled.

“What’s funny?” Rey asked while packing up her books again. 

“I just don’t imagine Kylo Ren having the patience to go around and pointing out a thousand soldiers as his favorites. I mean, he’d strain his finger before even being halfway right? Nah, I don’t believe it.” Finn said. He let her pass as they went out and circled back to the main hold. 

“We have quite a lot of new reinforcements on HQ. Maaz is there now. And a lot of the other inhabitants in Batuu. No one has even betrayed us yet.” Finn added. Rey was just about to say something positive when they heard a loud bang. Rey stopped dead in their tracks, then turned around and went back down the hallways towards the back. Rose was already there in a smoke-filled engine room. Rey snatched a mask from the wall and pulled it over her face. She looked over her shoulder at Finn who had the presence to do the same. 

“It’s the hyperdrive again!” Rose said, her voice tinged with desperation. 

“Can’t we make it with only the sublight engines for the last bit?” Finn asked. Rey shook her head. Sure they could use them, but they’d risk burning them out too. The batteries they put in were only good for landing and takeoff and could not manage much more. 

“We do that then we can probably reach Pasaana, and land there. But not get back up again.” Rose said. 

“So what do we do?” Finn asked, panicking. 

“We’ll have to find new batteries, along with our new soldiers,” Rey said.

“That’s fine then. We’ll nick some from the first order base.” Finn said. Rey nodded.

“Yes. Will you go tell the others? I’ll help Rose keep this ship running until we’re on steady ground.” Rey said. 

-

Pasaana was so much like Jakku. Covered in sand. Boiling under the sun. But instead of it being covered in junk and hungry slaves. It had actual people that seemed to live happy lives. Small animals could be seen, and they didn’t even seem the least bit afraid that they’d be eaten by Rey and her friends as the past by.

“Alright. So, let’s get our contact.” Poe said, standing at a dune looking down at the sparkling festival beneath them. Bright colors flew over their heads, a dry powder that smelled of soft lavender flowers. In the distance, Rey could smell hot food and sweet drinks. It made her stomach churn. 

“Yeah. So. How do we find them?” Finn asked while checking the holster for his blaster at his hip. 

“Purple powder,” Rose said. 

“Huh?” Finn asked. 

“You see the fireworks? Well it's not real fireworks. It’s powderpuffs. And our contact will fire purple ones.” Rose explained and pointed down towards the festival.

“I think I just saw some. But it’s faded now.” Rey said. She tried to remember exactly where that cloud had been fired from. She pointed towards the eastern part of the festival.

“Somewhere over there.” She said. 

“All right let’s go!” Poe said and started in the appointed direction. C3P0 stumbled behind him, trying to keep the pace. Rose turned around and looked back from where they’d come from. Behind the dunes, next to some rocks, they’d tossed some camouflaging nets over the millennium falcon. Trying to make it look like a rock, next to other rocks. They were lucky enough to have found some old nets in the hold, that wasn’t too broken. Rey could feel Rose’s worry, though. They’d left chewie behind, with Zorii, Babu Frik and their crew. They had agreed to guard the Falcon if they got a ride to safety after this mission. But it felt strange to leave Chewie alone with so many of such new-found friends. Rose didn’t have Rey's access into their minds, couldn’t see that they, for sure, didn’t have a hidden agenda.

They set off into the festival. Their sand-colored clothes seemed a bad fit. Everyone was clothed in bright reds and greens and yellows. People where smiling. And Rey found herself smile too. It was an intoxicating aura of joy. Without thinking too much about it, she had wandered off. She stood among a class of kids, sitting down and listening to the story of some elder. This was the life that she had wanted as a kid. Friends and companionship. A place to be, that would cherish her and bring her up. Rey felt a knock on her back and turned around to one of the locals, dressed in green. They looked like a teenager, not completely adult, nor a child.

“She is saying, welcome.“ C3P0 said. Rey hadn’t noticed that he’d followed her. She had been too enraptured by everything around her. Rey sat down on her knees, facing the little girl. She seemed so sweet, not afraid, nor asking too much of Rey. She was just a kind and curious girl. It was amazing. The girl held up a necklace with wooden pearls and thread tufts. Rey smiled wide at the sweet gesture and bent down her head. The girl put the necklace over her and spoke again. 

“Her name is Nambigima” C3P0 translated. 

“That’s an excellent name. I’m Rey.” Rey said, her voice kind and gentle. The girl spoke again. Rey tried to feel for her meaning but got only wafts of the girl's innocent curiosity and happiness. 

“She would be honored to hear your family name too.” C3P0 translated. That’s right. This girl didn’t know what it was to be completely alone. She didn’t know what it was to be outside the safety of a family. Rey's smile melted away. If they managed to create the diversion that they aimed for. The girl might come to know some of those things. 

“I don’t have one. I’m just Rey.” Rey said. And she smiled gently. The girl accepted it. And bowed her head as C3P0 translated back to her. 

In the distance, Rey saw a purple puff of dust being pumped into the air. She hurried toward it, C3P0 doing his best to follow. She saw the others zig-zagging between the crowd toward the same spot. Good. They’d seen it too. A man with a large flat helmet and an extravagant large collar stood beside the tank spewing purple into the sky. 

“Follow me,” the man says. Then he turns and walks into a nearby tent. Rey looks over at the others. They seem convinced. She follows the man into the tent. He takes off his helmet, and they are faced with a mustached and kind-looking face. Rey recognizes it from the legends, from Leia's many pictures. Lando Calrissian. 

“Leia sent me a transmission,” Lando says. 

“It’s a good thing we found you,” Finn says, nodding. Rey noticed that he was a little bit starstruck. She thought that maybe she had a bit of that too. It felt like they had lost so many of their heroes, it was good to finally have someone like him to give guidance. 

“Yes, that droid does really stand out in a crowd,” Lando says and nods to C3P0. 

“Oh. May I present myself? I am C3P0, translator of…” C3P0 started but Lando only laughed. 

“Sorry, we had to reset his memory. We hope to restore him when we get back to HQ.” Rey said. She still felt guilty over how that had gone down.

“It is truly an honor general” Finn said, offering Lando a hand. Lando laughed at them and shook the hand. Poe was of another mind, the stress dripping off him with his sweat. 

“General Calrissian. We’re looking for the 77th company.” Poe said. 

“Of course you are. And they’ve been looking for you too it seems. They’ve just not managed to make contact yet. But I got a good idea of where they might be now.” Lando said. He punched a few buttons on his wrist-unit and a small hologram of a cavern lit up. 

“They’ve been hiding in these mountains. There are hidden caverns thick enough to block out any tracking devices used by the First Order. Or us.” Lando said. 

“Right. So how do we find them.” Poe said, leaning over Rey's shoulder to get a closer look at the holocron. Rey gave him a nudge with the said shoulder when he got too close. He gave her a confused look. That then turned slightly irritated, before taking a step to the side. That’s right, he was stressed because they were late to the game. Because they’d gone to Kajimi. Which had turned out to be useless. And he was blaming her for that. She huffed in frustration. Technically they had managed to create another distraction by going to Kajimi. Just not a big enough one to make Kylo Ren actually pull the troops from Batuu. She wanted to cling to some sort of victory for distracting him, but, watching Kajimi fall apart as they fled soured that feeling. 

Lando flipped another switch and another hologram lit up. Of a ship, crashed in the dunes.

“This went down earlier this morning. I suspect it belongs to them. They have tried to get back and fix it twice today. Both times they have been interrupted by First Order troopers. Distract the troopers, and they will get to the ship.” Lando said. Smiling in a way that said that everything was going to be alright. 

“Distract the troopers, then get to the ship, and we make contact,” Rey said. Thinking it over. That’s when they heard the piping of TIE engines flying by over their heads. Rey held her breath. No, it couldn’t be possible. They couldn’t have found them so soon. 

“They have been flying by us for weeks. Searching the dunes for the company.” Lando said. 

“That’s gonna be a problem,” Poe said. Rey wanted to give him a shove, for stating the obvious. 

“There are ways to hide in heat,” Rey said. She had done it on Jakku. She could do this. They just had to be smarter than the First Order. Which was generally not that hard. 

“What do you mean? The desert is wide open space.” Poe said. Rey raised her eyebrows at him. He made a face, then conceded. 

“The heat makes it hard to see clearly from any large distance. The mirage effect blurs your vision. We only need a vehicle that looks native and innocent enough. And some clothes that don’t mark us as obvious intruders from a distance, then we will be okay. There is no way that they can identify us from the air if we do this right.” Rey said. She smiled wide, feeling her dimples form in her cheeks. She could correct the mistake she’d made. She could catch up on the lost time. She knew everything about the desert. 

“Great. We have a plan.” Finn said, happy. Smiling too. Rey felt her smile lessen a bit. But she tried to push through it, to laugh with him again as if nothing bad had ever happened. He looked away, obviously feeling her struggle. Rey swallowed. 

“Also, we need batteries,” Rose said. Rey had forgotten about that completely. For a horrid moment, she imagined it, how they succeeded at their mission only to fail when the falcon wouldn’t get off the planet again. 

-

They went for speed shopping. Grabbing red flowy cloaks to cover themselves in. Lando pointed them to a seller that had batteries. Not the exact right ones, but good enough batteries that could be adapted for the falcon. They’d have to do. They bought two speeders that looked very wonky but still functional, then they split up. Rose would go with C3P0 and ditch the batteries at the falcon. She’d have to make Babu understand that they wouldn’t be taking anyone to safety without them being properly installed. Whilst doing that Rey, Finn, and Poe made their way to the coordinates provided by Lando.

They passed the TIE fighters without a problem. Making good ground toward the crash site. Rey put in another gear on the old speeder, steering it closer to some cliffs to hide them just in case someone did find them suspicious.

“Great plan Rey!” Finn shouted. She could barely hear him over the engine. He looked like an old lady huddled in that red cape. And Poe looked like his angry old man. Rey laughed, and they sent her questioning looks. They didn’t get what was so funny. Then she saw their faces go blank and their mouths open. Finn’s finger pointed straight ahead and she turned to see what it was about. There where two troopers on their own single-seated speeders. They would see them. Rey tried to focus, to project into their minds a command that all was okay. That they would see nothing. She could feel their minds bend, form. Agree. Then everything went wrong all at once. The speeder hit a rock, while she was concentrating, and they went flying in the air. Rey screams as she hits the sand hard. She is dizzy and confused. And strangely cold. She blinks away the stars winking in her field of vision. Before the full force of Pasaana's sun burns her eyes. She cries out as she feels her legs cold and stiff. She is stuck in something. Off in the far distance, she can see the troopers continue on their speeders as if they’d were blind to everything going on around them. Poe and Finn were crawling on the ground nearby the speeder. She tried to get up, to get close to them. But she only felt herself sinking into the sand. She tried to relax, tried to not struggle so that they could see her and try and get her out. But the sand was so hungry. She could hear Finn's voice screaming her name as she was swallowed up into the silent sand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't want to stuff all this in the last chapter so I chopped them into two. If you are wondering why this chapter is missing a certain tense scene... that scene will be the next chapter.


	9. Yours is an empty hope (POV Rey)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack: Yours is an empty hope https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtXqUNB8zrU&list=PLxiRwn6xBZJ1H9MgOicq0zs5Rav9FFD8F&index=9
> 
> Rey is stuck, alone in the dark. When she faces the supreme leader again.

Rey was holding her breath. She was keeping her eyes closed as she slid through the sinking sands. How deep would it go? Then she felt space beneath her feet. She fell down into a cavern of some sort. All was dark, the ground was cold underneath her, so different from the hot desert above. She sat up and tried to feel for something in the force. Life. Or danger. But there was nothing. Nothing but the sensuous whispers of the holocron she still had in her bag. Don’t be afraid of who you are, it whispered. It smiled at her, welcoming. Tempting. She could remember the visions she’d had before, her eyes corrupted and yellow. As she was burning through flesh with her saber. She shook her head, getting rid of that haunting image. It would not come to be.  
She stood up and reached for her saber. She could use it as a torch for now. Try to find a way out. As soon as her fingers touched the hilt, she felt a familiar movement in the force. Her teeth set, her jaw clenched tightly together. Her body went stiff for a moment, as she collected herself. She finally tore the saber off her hip and lit it. It’s blue light revealed his mask, waiting in silence for her. His cloak was smoking as if he had walked through fire. He brought a smell of blood and death with him. Smoke slowly trickled into the tunnel, from where he was. From Kajimi, she realized. Suddenly she was drowning in empathy. For those that he had cut down so mercilessly, just to find her. Her eyes stung with sorrow, her cheeks were burning with fury. How dare he? 

“Rey,” Kylo said. She flinched. She wanted to tear that word from his mouth. He shouldn’t be allowed to speak it at all.

“Wherever you are, you are hard to find.” He said, in a lighthearted manner that made her tremble in her frustration. 

“You’re hard to get rid of,” she whispered. Slowly he moved to circle around her, but her space to move with him was limited in the tunnel. Yet, whenever she looked at him, he was standing in the corridor. Whilst still somehow moving around it. The taste of smoke filled the air. Impenetrable. Inescapable. It couldn’t be real. It made her head spin. She stepped backward, almost losing her balance, as something large fell from above her. It landed right in front of her and broke like glass into a thousand pieces onto the ground. It was ice-taps. It chilled her feet as she walked across the pieces. She swallowed. She couldn’t lose focus. Not with him around. But nothing was making sense. Everything was collapsing in on itself and she was stuck in the midst of it.

“It need not be this way.” He started. She sneered at him. It all seemed too similar to her own pleas. The ones that had fallen on deaf ears. Rey huffed and turned her back to him, walking down the claustrophobic corridor that was pressing on her mind. There was nothing but black emptiness in front of her. She looked back and saw only the black ring of the tunnel fade away. He was no longer there. 

“You can lash out at me, Rey, but you know the truth,” Kylo said. She turned again, he was standing behind her. Hot red light filling the passage. She cursed the connection she had with him and how it tormented her. He sounded so calm, whilst she was shuddering on the inside. 

“You can churn your lies over and over, it is nothing to me,” Rey said with artificial confidence and shook her head. She turned yet again and walked down the other way, away from him. But she could see the red light following her in the tunnel.

“I’ve never lied to you.” He said. His voice getting more distant as she gained ground. But she could hear his tall strides as he decided to follow.

“You claim to want to save the world, yet you turn your nose up at the opportunity to do so.” He said as he was catching up to her. She could feel his fingers reaching for her arm. She pulled it back before he could get a hold. She turned and kicked a rock and a cloud of gravel at him. He swiped it away with the force. She took that moment to start running down the tunnel. Having no idea of where she was going. What had created this cavern underground? Where was it taking her? She had no control, no way to take control over the situation either. 

“There is nowhere to run Rey!” He called after her. She felt the truth of it hit her. He was right. She would have to face him. But not right now, she thought. Right now was just something malicious in the force, playing a cruel trick on them. 

“You bombed a city today! For what? This is just a joke to you!” She yelled, confident that he would hear her.

“I didn’t!” He roared behind her, angry. Then the red light went out. But she knew it wasn’t over. She paused in her flight. Closed her eyes and took a breath, then swung her saber at the presence she felt so close to her. A red crossguard flamed to life again and met her saber. She ignited the other side of her staff and twisted it around, almost tearing his saber out of his hands. She could smell the earth burning, small flames collected in a hoop along the edge of the tunnel where she’d cut it. In the dying flames she saw him tear off his helmet with his free hand, then he dropped it to the ground where it disappeared. He looked jaded, haunted. By the battle that he had been fighting all day. From guilt tearing at his mind. She recognized it as the feeling she too had been harboring. Was he the source of that feeling? Or was her feelings the source of his? Or were they really in such a similar position, for such different reasons. 

“Then I’m not the naive one Ben. You are!” Rey screamed at him. Her throat felt raw with emotion. He pointed a finger at her, collecting his shaky breaths. He was struggling to speak again, in that way that had become familiar to her. She hurt with him, as he struggled, even though she didn’t want to. He was too familiar. 

“It was for you. All of it was for you.” He said, putting great emphasis on the end of each sentence. They hit her like a hammer, breaking bone and limb. She staggered back with each accusation. 

“The world is at your feet Rey. See that!” He said, stepping after her. Frustration twisted his face. It made her sick. The ground seemed to rumble, as if an earthquake was about to take place. She wanted to vomit. 

“Can you not feel the pain around you?” Rey said. Backing away. He stood up tall and switched his saber off. The red light fell with it. They stood only in the light of her blue saber now. 

“Of course I can.” He said. Nodding as he said it. As if it was the most obvious thing in the world. And she knew that it was true. She could feel it flow through him. But he wallowed in it. Like adrenaline, feeding him and his convictions instead of turning him away from them.

“Then why don’t you give it up? Why did you kill your friends instead of letting them help you? Why did you burn—” Rey said, but he interrupts her. 

“I didn’t!” He screamed, louder this time. 

“Why can’t you turn away from this hatred? I can’t take it anymore!” She screamed back, rising her voice with his.

“It is all lies. You know the truth! But I can’t force you to accept it!” He said, moving between a bitter snicker and angry shouts.

“I wish you would wake up from this!” she cried. Her voice breaking from so much yelling. She wanted to weep but when had that ever helped her? Not with him. She gritted her teeth, feeling the chill tingle spread down her spine. 

“Then wake me up.” He said. His voice almost gentle. He clicked his saber back into his belt and extended his hand to her, stepping closer again. 

“It’s not up to me.” She answered, stepping back. 

“I’d give you everything.” He whispered. His voice sounding desperate. She had to look away. She wanted to give in to that. Wanted this horrible tension to settle into something, anything. As long as she never has to do this again. 

“I read the holocron. I saw what the dark side advises you to do with allies.” Rey whispered, staring at his hand. 

“Rey… it’s not—” he whispered. But she is the one to interrupt him this time. She glared straight at him and his eyes, so observant. But so stubborn. 

“It. Will. Never. Happen.” Rey screamed. Biting down on every word. He pulled his hand back and stopped in his tracks. In her chest, her heart was thundering. When she tried to calm it down it only seemed to go faster. She had to let go. Or she’d die. She was sure of it. She moved her finger to her ignition button and switched one half of the saber off. The shadows hunted the dissipating light. She kept the one side alight. Afraid what would happen if she could not keep track of him at all. Afraid of the dark. 

“We’re a dyad in the force Rey. Two that are one. You must accept the power that it brings us. And learn how to use it.” He said. She couldn’t stand the look on his face. His eyes too emotional too intimate. Her finger trembled as she shut off the other side of her saber too. Complete darkness enveloped them. 

“You would only use it against me,” Rey whispered. In the dark, his breaths echoed in the earthy corridor, along with her own. The smell of smoke and blood fading. She felt the connection choking, any moment now. Then his hand reached for her throat, clasped into a fist over her chest, it pulled hard. Then he was gone. She was alone again. She put her hand on her chest, feeling for the necklace. She bent down and felt for it on the ground. But she couldn’t find anything. Just dirt, rocks, and gravel. She ignited one side of her saber again. Having a final look around her. The necklace was gone. And she knew what he needed it for. Her breath got stuck in her chest as she realized how much time she’d just lost. She had to get out of there. Immediately.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I have been writing horror lately... It might have been affecting this chapter a bit. Heh. I still like this idea. It was fun to write. Hope you liked it.

**Author's Note:**

> I have a script for this entire thing but if you have any ideas on what should happen, tell me. I'll need it. hehe.  
> Also, wanna betaread? I'm just using software now to autocorrect stuff. would be nice with a human interface.  
> Also... sorry if it doesn't read like fanfic, i usually write other things and english isn't my first language so, this is a challenge for me haha. ( A FUN CHALLENGE... that I like to do :D But please give me some love if you like it. keeps me going. :D)


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